Talk:Prostate cancer/Archive 1

message: What are the thoughts of hyperbaric treatment (HBOT) for patients diagnosed with prostate cancer who have undergone radiation treatment and now additionally have osteoradionecrosis to contend with.  Specifically, I am interested in determining the potential benefits to the body as a whole for patients receiving HBOT.  Even if some of the areas receiving benefit are not specifically cancer related.  i.e. Chronic leukemia, respiratory problems, muscle tone, etc.
thank you
:This is a rather specialised treatment that may be too technical to include into this article in great detail. JFW | T@lk 03:59, 20 October 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  hyperbaric treatement of osteoradionecrosis 

message: This note is added here rather than being implemented as an edit to the article as I see the article as well written and want the information to be considered for inclusion in a way that does not undermine its quality.
 this should be a publically available link
This article links the genes ERG, ETV1 and TMPRSS2 with prostate cancer as a bioinformatics-generated observation; causality or functional involvment remains to be determined. I'll look at working on those gene links later ... disappointing that they don't even exist in disambiguation space at first glance.
Regards, Courtland 13:30, 28 October 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Newly reported genetic information 

message: As Leedar noted above, for such an important topic which affects men of all nationalities, this article assumes the reader is living in the US. I am not taking issue with the large amount of extremely useful information from various American sources. I am taking issue with phrases such as:
"Doctors all over the country are conducting many types of clinical trials..."
What country? Is there only one country doing Prostate Cancer research? 
"The Cancer Information Service can provide information about these studies."
What "Cancer Information Service"? The US one? The UK one?
"African Americans have the highest incidence of prostate cancer in the world."
Does this mean "black people" or "black people from the US"? Because of how the article is written from a very US point of view, it is unclear if it is referring to a specific group, or is simply using American terminology.
There are also many frequent references to the NCI (which I assume is a US Cancer research institute), which do not make much sense to someone who is not from the US. It would be confusing if someone were to refer to the British NCI as simply the "NCI" in the same article. Perhaps if it was referred to as the American NCI, it would be helpful?
I'm sorry if it seems like I'm nit-picking, but a bit of cleaning-up (by someone who knows more about the topic than I do) would really improve the clarity of the article. This could be the first place a man who suspects he has prostate cancer comes to (I know I look up Wikipedia when I want to find something out), so it is especially important to have a good article which does not assume anything about the reader.
Thanks for listening, Thebluemeanie 16:29, 29 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks for the plug.  I agree, this article does need a workover!  Though, I don't think I can singlehandedly give it the level of attention of say  InvictaHOG that the article deserves!.   12:17, 30 October 2005 (UTC)

text: I think this is an excellent candidate for the medicine collaboration of the week, added it to the list of candidates. --WS 10:18, 30 October 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Anyone else think this article is very US-centric? 

message: I'm curious about why the introduction of a website link that does not appear to be (at first glance) advertising or vandalism was reverted. Courtland 00:46, 31 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Because we're already drowning in URLs with "news, information and support" on 100s of health-related pages. Many of them are not authoratitive by any standard and promulgate dangerous myths, others have an axe to grind, and a lot just regurgitate unedited science news that is poorly tailored to its audience and which confuses and scares. The site today contains a link to an article on antibody therapy in prostate cancer... in an animal model! This is on the front page, while information about PSA, surgery and radiotherapy is buried deep inside it. A classical example of a page to which Wikipedia should not link. JFW | T@lk 01:11, 31 October 2005 (UTC)

text: Oh, of course PSA and surgery are mentioned, but in the form of "news" and not an easily-accessible resource with background information. JFW | T@lk
Oh well, I'm pretty sure that the person will never visit Wikipedia to input again considering the alacrity with which his/her edit was dumped into the dust bin, treated no less aggressively than a page blanking or blatent vandalism would be.  That's likely a comforting thought, yes?  By the way, you can nominate Prostate Troubles (website) for deletion any time, but I think it is useful to clarify whether someplace is an enemy ("dangerous myths, axe to grind") before assuming any new face belongs to one. Courtland 05:42, 31 October 2005 (UTC)

text: I have never heard a poorer argument for retaining an external link. Since when do we treat articles with kid's gloves to retain anonymous editors? I will indeed VFD your new article, which violates WP:POINT. If you don't like my attempts to improve the quality of our "external links" sections, you should request an RFC. JFW | T@lk 08:24, 31 October 2005 (UTC)

text: I've filed an RFC on this issue. JFW | T@lk 13:04, 31 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I really am unsure why you've taken such a drastic step as to go to RFC; I've never had one filed as a result of a dispute I've been involved in (but there is always a first).  I take pains to point out a) I did not revert your removal, b) I did not add a link to the new website article to the Prostate cancer article, c) I pointed out that there are other options to the reversion that you conducted, d) there are principles of conduct that do not demand "kid gloves" but encourage assumption of good faith.  Also, I really do not think it behooves you to invoke intent in a VfD .. deletions of articles are to be done based on content not on the assumed intent on the part of the person(s) who created and expanded the article; is that not a correct working principle for VfD? Courtland 18:25, 31 October 2005 (UTC)

text: My "starting discussion" below is based on my feeling a bit guilty for getting you so upset over this issue.  I am interested in this issue as I don't want to see cruft accumulating either ... I'm more of the opinion though of tolerating leeway in editing and revising after consideration than shoot-first-and-ask-questions-if-they-are-still-alive.  Yes, that leeway-based behavior will lead to articles being crufty around the edges, but keep in mind that this is not nor should it ever be a primary resource for patient information; on the other hand, it is also not the public's notebook on the disorder.  It is an encyclopedia article and needs to serve both the sensibilities of regular editors and those of readers who might be or become occasional editors; the matter of whether a person should ever be allowed to edit an article if they are not involved in it's crafting over the long term or if they are not a domain expert (in this case read "physician") is not a matter for debate here, though it is a matter over which much virtual blood is spilled daily throughout the Wikipedia editing community. Courtland 19:07, 31 October 2005 (UTC)

text:  On the matter of intent - just a word on whether the anonymous person who added the link that sparked all this was acting in good faith or acting to draw attention to a personal resource that might put money into his/her pockets.  My assumption was of good faith on the part of the editor.  The lack of a website link devoted to patient-patient communication (he/she might well have overlooked, albeit foolishly, Prostate Cancer Survivor as such a site) might have a) prompted the person to build such a site (the person might have prostate cancer right now, for instance) or b) add such a site to the listing having just run across it him/herself.  Now, we will never know whether this was a very sick person (physically, not mentally) who was trying to address an (to him/her) apparent deficit in the article or a spammer looking for dollars.  Personally, I'd rather first assume good faith.  We'll never know which of our guesses as to intent is right, and in the end it doesn't matter. Courtland 19:07, 31 October 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Why the revert? 

message: * A note has been posted in the talk space for WP:WEB inviting comment on this matter here. Courtland 11:44, 2 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Related notes not directly in the discussion thread

message: Dr Wolff, you are wrong.  We know the etiology of few cancers, and should not confuse a model of pathogenesis with understanding causation in prostate cancer.  The etiology of cancer of cervix seems to be HPV, under the influence of several epidemiologically identifiable co-factors and promotors.   If you know the causal etiology of prostate cancer, please enlighten us.  If you understand this, you may revert your edit, and retract your comment.  Bcameron54 20:29, 29 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: etiology, causation and association

message: I'd thought it would be nice to merge all previous debate into the archive and start with a tabula rasa.
This article, describing one of the most common forms of cancer, has undergone relatively little editing since landing on Wikipedia from an NIH page (here). It contains duplicate material which can easily be merged into prostate and prostate specific antigen. The English is rather lay-oriented and can probably be streamlined. 
Ideally, we should get a surgeon or urologist on-board to describe the indication, procedure and outcomes of radical prostatectomy and other methods. We need to identify pivotal trials that showed the benefit of goserelin and bicalutamide, the preventative and therapeutic use of finasteride, and indications for orchidectomy. What radiotherapy modalities are used (we can ask User:Brim or User:Andrew73) and has brachytherapy been tried?
For an issue like screening you really need a clinician who does screening, that is dealing with asymptomatic men. In post parts of the world this is a primary care physicians role. 
I'm interested to see how this article will fare! JFW | T@lk 01:56, 22 November 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Brachytherapy is definitely being used, e.g. Theraseed.  Prostate cancer is not my area of expertise, but I'll see if I can add some cents here and there!  Andrew73 02:45, 22 November 2005 (UTC)

text: I actually have an image of brachytherapy seeds (along with a few more) that I'm going to put up whenever the servers are upgraded and we can upload again! InvictaHOG 02:54, 22 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: MCOTW

message: I am inclined to scrap the current layout in favor of the clinical medicine template. I've started by rewriting the prostate section and moving the symptoms up. I think that we should make the oncogenesis portion into pathophysiology and incorporate all of the risk factor stuff into one epidemiology section. I have images for Gleason, brachytherapy, and microscopic pathology that I'm working on. I don't have a good gross path, but I'm working on it. There's a lot of fluff that can be cut and condensed. I'll be reading about staging and therapy over the holidays but might not be able to add much to the article during that time. I think that off-loading the staging would be awesome. We might even end up off-loading the therapy section, but it doesn't look like we'll need it right now. I think that screening should remain a separate section within diagnosis. We could probably benefit from a separate Gleason article, probably best linked under diagnosis or prognosis. InvictaHOG 04:08, 23 November 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I have replaced the epidemiology, prostate, and symptoms sections with referenced prose. I think that the rest of the article deserves the same treatment. I'd probably hold off on copyediting the rest until that change has been made. It might take another week, but I think that this article has quite a ways to go to be great. I don't want anyone to waste time correcting wording, etc. that will just be replaced anyway! InvictaHOG 16:22, 25 November 2005 (UTC)

text: I've referenced everything but the diagnosis and treatment sections. Hopefully will finish one or both over this weekend. I replaced the lead article because it looked poorly scanned (could see lettering in background!). Hopefully the new lead is more acceptable. I'm looking into adding a history section, as well. I have a few web leads but need to track down a few textbooks to verify. I've started a Gleason article with an image and a transrectal ultrasound. We still need articles for the surgeries and the SERMs that I added to prevention. I expect that the treatment and diagnosis section will condense greatly and the length of the article will be better, as well! Soon we'll be able to delete the disclaimer at the bottom and claim the page as our own instead of an outside government agency! InvictaHOG 04:32, 1 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I can hopefully help reference some of that as well. Great job with the Gleason's article—I can't believe you just whipped that up! By the way, I nominated it on for WP:DYK. — Knowledge Seeker দ 05:17, 1 December 2005 (UTC)

text: Thanks for the nomination, Knowledge Seeker! I've added a history section - I didn't realize that there were two Nobel prizes so closely associated with prostate cancer! Hopefully the treatment and diagnoses sections will be done over the weekend and anything else that pops up on peer review can be addressed. InvictaHOG 21:36, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

text: I've added some images and reworked the screening and diagnosis sections. Just the treatment left right now. InvictaHOG 21:17, 4 December 2005 (UTC)

text: Just needing references for radiation and hormone therapy. Got rid of a lot of red links today, have a few more to go. Working on an image for the different hormone therapies. InvictaHOG 03:21, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

text: Finished the image tonight. Hopefully finish the hormonal therapy section tomorrow night. I'll write the radiation proctitis article, too. Interesting thing that I hadn't run into much before InvictaHOG 05:15, 8 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  My thoughts for this page 

message: Where was that study that tomatoes are good? JFW | T@lk 08:45, 23 November 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Free full text review of evidence at  InvictaHOG 14:09, 23 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Lycopene 

message: This article is quite long, which is not necessarily a bad thing. I split the Prostate cancer#stages off to a separate article, Prostate cancer staging. Are there any other sections that would benefit from being split off? That is, are there any we'd like to expand but we're trying to keep from over-burdening this article? — Knowledge Seeker দ 19:48, 29 November 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I still think that it needs a lot of work. I plan on reworking and referencing the treatment section. I think it may end up needing to be off-loaded. We'll have to see! InvictaHOG 19:57, 29 November 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: A thought -- most of the content in "Pathophysiology" has nothing to do with prostate cancer per se, and could be replaced with a single sentence with relevant links. --Arcadian 23:13, 29 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Splits 

message: I have a concern about the 'Screening' section, but I know it's somewhat controversial topic, so I wanted to take it here instead of just editing it myself. The second paragraph seems to have a POV on discouraging people from having the PSA test. At least we should find some recommendations from different organizations. Here's some useful links about recommendations, and here's some research on the correlation of PSA with cancer: , , , , . --Arcadian 22:34, 2 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Screening was the one thing that I knew would be sticky beforehand. I've been trying to read as much as possible and am hoping to make a valiant effort this weekend to get a referenced section. It's difficult because several societies recommend large-scale PSA screening while the Evidence based medicine group does not. Everything should definitely be presented in a NPOV way! InvictaHOG 22:50, 2 December 2005 (UTC)

text: Even PSA velocity isn't that grand. I'm going to spend all day on it tomorrow! InvictaHOG 03:19, 4 December 2005 (UTC)

text: I think that prostate cancer screening could probably do with an article all its own. The whole issue of informed consent, etc. is just way too much to include in this article. It's hard to imagine having a complete discussion about prostate cancer without at least mentioning it, however. InvictaHOG 21:17, 4 December 2005 (UTC)

text: Yeah, it does need to be split off. I can work on that tonight. Nice job on taking care of the red links. People are going to wonder why so many prostate-cancer-related items are appearing on DYK ;) (Gleason score, prostate cancer staging, flutamide, and so on). — Knowledge Seeker দ 23:53, 6 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I started the split; it's just a stub so far but I'll expand it tomorrow and perhaps trim a bit here then. Keep up the good work, InvictaHOG. — Knowledge Seeker দ 07:33, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

text: Awesome! I rewrote the radiation therapy section. It really sucks when an article has been poached from a well-written site. It's much easier to write one from scratch than to have this nice prose just sitting there taunting you. I strongly feel that a featured article should not contain passages lifted wholesale from other sites, but it's hard to cut out good explanations of concepts like radiation therapy. Right now the only part that needs to be replaced is hormone therapy - I'm going to work on the section and an image tonight. I think that a section on palliative/salvage therapy might be nice, too. A few more red links, and then I think it will be ready! InvictaHOG 11:21, 7 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Screening

message: Do the names of genes, such as BRCA1 and BRCA2, need to be italicized?  The Gene page nomenclature section refers to the HUGO database, where the names are not italicized, and they are also not italicized on Wikipedia's List of notable genes.   Rewster 17:19, 9 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: You got me there, I haven't a clue if there is a convention or whether we're following it! InvictaHOG 20:13, 9 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Short answer: yes. The Chicago Manual of Style (15th ed.) recommends: "8.140 Genes. Names of genes, or gene symbols, including any arabic numerals that form a part of such names, are usually italicized...Gene names contain no Greek characters or roman numerals. Human gene symbols are set in full capitals, as are the genes for other primates...Protein names...are set in roman." So the VHL gene produces VHL protein. This matches both my New England Journal of Medicine and Harrison's, so unless anyone has any objections, I'll modify the entries accordingly. I'll try to incorporate this into the Manual of Style as well. — Knowledge Seeker দ 07:12, 14 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Gene names

message: I finished reworking the hormone section today. There are a few red links which I plan to address tomorrow! I struck out the box - anything else we should be addressing?  InvictaHOG 03:53, 10 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: No more red links! InvictaHOG 04:26, 11 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text:  How about putting it up for featured article candidate right now and see what comments come from that? --WS 04:29, 11 December 2005 (UTC)

text:  Done! InvictaHOG 07:10, 11 December 2005 (UTC)

text: Can we strengthen the prognosis section?  Currently it only contains information that can be found elsewhere in the article.  Suggestions?  --Rewster 06:20, 12 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Someone commented on the Featured article candidates page that "it would be nice to know the prognosis for men with prostate cancer in places other than the United States". I found a link that indicated that the survival rates are not as good in Europe due to lack of standardised early screening. This is beyond my area of expertise, so perhaps one of you might be able to work with it. Edwardian 06:58, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

text: You are absolutely correct (not that I had to tell you that!). I purposely avoided addressing the topic because it is simply too messy and honestly didn't think it belonged here. It's the primary reason why I was hesitant to start rewriting prostate cancer in the first place! I thought about writing a separate article, but figured it would be of limited usefulness compared to the other topics which require attention. I've not personally heard of Wilson's criteria before...maybe you can write the article and teach us all something! InvictaHOG 01:14, 14 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Is this what you're referring to? --Arcadian 01:57, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

text: See my comments in the discussion on the screening (medical) page. There should be enough material there for someone to work with.Jellytussle 04:54, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

text: This has been clarified in the article.  Andrew73 17:05, 18 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Anything else? 

message: Please remove (or edit) the reference to TURP in the surgical treatment of cancer. TURP is for benign disease . Only role in prostate cancer is to palliate obstruction. It is not used with curative intent , and this should be made clear. The current version may lead a lay person to think TURP is used for cancer treatment.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Tony Makhlouf  (talk • contribs) 
: This has been clarified in the article.  Andrew73 17:05, 18 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: TURP