It was a pleasure to work with you, as you and your team made this process a more pleasant experience for our team and the participants.
Karen Perry
Wikipedia contains errors in about 90% of its health care-related pages, according to a new study published in the Journal of the American Osteopathic Association, BBC News reports.
Researchers say patients should use information on the site with caution (Stephens, BBC News, 5/27).
In April 2012, 10 U.S. researchers analyzed Wikipedia entries on 10 of the "most costly" medical conditions in the country, including:
Researchers then compared the articles with peer-reviewed medical research on the ailments.
The researchers said the Wikipedia entries contained "many errors." Specifically, the study found that 90% of the entries contained information that contradicted the latest medical research on the condition.
As many as 70% of doctors and medical students use Wikipedia, according to researchers.
According to BBC News, Wikipedia's 30 million articles can be edited by anyone. However, volunteers from the medical field check entries for inaccuracies, according to Wikimedia UK -- the British version of the site.
Still, the website's open access model has "raised concern" about its reliability among medical professionals, according to the researchers.
Lead study author Robert Hasty, with the Wallace School of Osteopathic Medicine in North Carolina, said, "While Wikipedia is a convenient tool for conducting research, from a public health standpoint patients should not use it as a primary resource because those articles do not go through the same peer-review process as medical journals." Hasty added that physicians are the "best resource" for medical information.
Stevie Benton with Wikimedia also suggested that patients contact their primary care doctor "as a first point of call," adding, "Wikipedia, like any encyclopedia, should not take the place of a qualified medical practitioner" (BBC News, 5/27).
It was a pleasure to work with you, as you and your team made this process a more pleasant experience for our team and the participants.
I just want to tell you that I value people relations more than money. I remember how you were friendly and helpful not going against policies and contractual obligations at the same time, not using your power to make us feel stupid and small. It was a very rare and big experience for me. Really. I will always remember this.
The Usability People are all individuals that you can become friends with very easily. They have a lot of different interests and are a pleasure to work with. I was writing a PRD/MRD for a billing solution and worked with The Usability People in defining the user interface. They are receptive to ideas and are able to mold the user interface from an end-user's perspective. I really liked the idea of putting end-user photograph & short biography around the office to help understand the users