Medical science site

Is sports science included into the scope? I imagine questions of the sort, "How to detect if you're overpronating/oversupinating while running?", "Proper posture for X without hurting Y", "What food should I bring on an marathon?"

My opinion is the affirmative.

Right now we don't have a good way of identifying people who would help build a new community, so let's do this: if you are interested in helping to build this site, please leave a comment describing your level of interest (casual visitor, enthusiast, expert in this topic within the site's scope, something else?). I'll edit them into the post later.

• I'm rather enthusiastic to participate and have a fair share of knowledge in some sub topics like cardiology, oncology, general risk factors and psychiatry. — Zerotime

• I would participate casually, asking the occasional question but almost certainly unable to contribute useful answers. — Monica Cellio

• I would participate casually, asking the occasional question but almost certainly unable to contribute useful answers. — msh210

• I would participate casually too. — user53100

• At this stage I would participate casually – I just don't know that much on the topic yet. My ability to write useful answers would increase as I work through college. — DonielF

• (Update 2020-11-04: interest is waning.) I'm rather enthusiastic to participate and have a fair share of knowledge in some areas. I am the author of some popular Q&A like; How much sea water can I safely drink? and Can dish soap really be used to kill ticks and fleas? - James Jenkins

• I have family members who work in the medical field. I'll get them to participate! — DNB

• Sign me up! I'm dumbstruck too why this hasn't been launched already. Who hasn't needed a doctor in their life? — Technologically illiterate‭

• There are two doctors in the family, and we'll definitely participate! — Chgg Clou‭

From comments and discussion on other posts here, I've seen that a disclaimer should be included. My proposal:

This site does not provide medical advice. Its purpose is to exchange information about medical sciences among interested persons. Information shared here may be incorrect and does not substitute medical advice. Please consult with your doctor for medical advice.
Questions and answers are neither provided nor endorsed by Codidact but rather by individual community members.
Please do not post personal medical information. This applies to information about yourself or others. This site is a public instance and everyone can access it. Personal medical information is deleted without further notice.

Please edit if you have something on your mind or provide a new disclaimer if it's completely different.

Sort of a niche interest: Would subjects like biochemistry be considered on-topic on such a site? Perhaps orgo in general?

This proposal seems to have a good baseline for moving forward. There are answers about definition, sometimes controversial, but it looks like there's a good foundation to work with -- y'all will have to work out some of the scope boundaries on your meta, but you've got a starting point. You've got some enthusiastic people who want to build this community, and more people who would participate casually -- it feels a little light, but we don't want to stand in the way if the enthusiastic people are prepared to step up.

One concern that's been raised, both here and on our team, is that this community seems likely to require more active moderation than usual. The community will need to be able to enforce its planned rules about (no) personal medical advice and credible sources. If you've got folks who are prepared to do that, we think this proposal can move forward.

Somewhat related to the disclaimer I already proposed, I would also like to propose a informational sign / warning / disclaimer when creating questions and answers, similar to the posting tips on each Codidact site. I can imagine something like the standard one and some extra information:

Questions and answers are better received if they...

• are specific,
• are not mostly or entirely based on opinions,
• are well written.

Aside from that, we ask you to provide credible references (link to help center and / or a resource page) for claims you make that are outside accepted practice (link to help center and / or a resource page). We don't expect you to do a thorough literature review but we do expect a reference as a starting point. Very general questions about health-related matters (link to help center and / or a resource page) don't need references.

With very general questions, I mean questions like the following:

• What should I do to ease the pain from my headache?
• Why is being obese detrimental for your heart?
• What bone is the largest one in the human body?
• How can I lower my cholesterol levels?

I support a site, that does NOT exclude questions because they might be looking for a 'diagnoses'

I was involved in what is now MedicalSciences.se from its beginning at Area 51

https://area51.stackexchange.com/proposals/66048?phase=definition

At the time of launch diagnostic related questions where allowed. Sometime later the scope was changed.

I have also been member of pets.se since it launched. Questions and answers about diagnoses and treatment are allowed.

Yes, some people post really bad answers, and the community deals with them, it has not been a problem.

Yes, caring an knowledgeable people who can answer and assess other answers will become part of the community.

Yes, it is easy to say people should go to a doctor for the answer, but for many people that is not an option.

Half the world lacks access to essential health services source

Related Meta post on pets.se

• https://pets.meta.stackexchange.com/questions/319/is-consult-a-vet-an-appropriate-answer
• https://pets.meta.stackexchange.com/questions/798/should-medical-emergencies-always-be-off-topic

Examples (By Request)

There is no need to exclude any kind of what is wrong with me questions. When you have a quality site and you choose not to answer a category of question, the person searching the internet for an answer is still going to find one, they just are not going to find a good answer that has been reviewed. The person has all ready made the decision to look for the answer on the internet, lets try to give them the best possible answer.

• Doctors are not always correct, some times the answer is go get a second opinion. My dog's right eye is dislodged from the socket, do I need a second opinion?

• Sometimes the internet can not diagnosis the problem, and the best answer is go see a doctor and this why, while bad answers get downvotes and/or closed Betta fish fin tear or rot?

• Sometimes the treatment is basic first aid Does this koi carp injury need attention, and how would I treat it? having an answer with reviews is a much better option for the person (who is already searching on line for a solution) then some random blog.

• Sometimes they just don't get answered (no example provided)

• Lastly, yes you can diagnosis a broken leg without an Xray machine. People have been doing it and treating them for thousands of years. Maybe you can't diagnosis a fracture, nor can you identify a tumor. But for these types of questions it is opportunity to show why they need to seek a medical professional and the possible issues of not doing so.

Also consider the option of closing as a dupe. The is this leg broken and what do I do about, only needs to be a single question. New posts get closed as a dupe and the OP is pointed to the existing Q&A.

How to know when to down vote or close answers that are not good?

Assuming you and the OP have about the same amount of knowledge on the subject, if an answer does seem right or complete to you and there are no references supporting it then down vote and/or vote to delete the answer. (^Maybe ping the poster and give them the option to improve first*)

Its usage could vary from Web MD syle Q&As to how certain joints function, to how neurons work or how diseases like ALS or strokes work.

Stick a big "nothing here is medical advice" disclaimer on the page footer for good measure, and let people with questions and answers about the human condition come together to grow a compendium of their knowledge.

Don't obsess over what percentage of people would label 'pseudoscience' or 'misinformation'. Those terms are manipulative, and we've observed misinformation become trusted information and vice versa in recent history. Do not forget that leeches were once the very best medical science according to the experts in the field.

'Perfect' is the enemy of 'done'. Few things medical can ever be proven/guaranteed absolutely and withholding information that isn't certain does more harm than sharing it in context and encouraging open dialogue.

I look forward to participating in this community.

Resources

This community should consider compiling and jointly curating a "resources" category (or something similar that serves the same purpose). This could include lists of good (= reliable, credible) references, perhaps broken up by medical sub-field. It could also include a list or lists of sources the community considers unreliable and why, and maybe some tips (for the layperson) on how to identify unreliable sources. (Is it always obvious what's peer-reviewed and what's not, for example?) Another type of useful resource could be a compilation of links to different jurisdictions' applicable regulations. (I'm not a medical person myself so I'm guessing on this one.)

This isn't good idea. There's a Biology proposal already.

Medical related question is off-topic Biology SE.

Am I saying that I want to mark Medical related question off-topic in CD also? Actually, not.

Look Medical Science is part of Biology.

Biology -> Bios (creatures) + Logos (knowledge)

I am interested in this Medical Science as I always study of human body in Internet.

I think if Medical Science fit in Biology CD. And, According to Biology proposal's Monica's answer we currently don't have much more enthusiast of Biology (It's really hard topic).

Disadvantage of Medical Science Site

According to this post, we currently don't have any doctor (have lot of knowledge of Medical Science) in our community. And, there's lot of enthusiast. But, I think most of them are "researcher" on Internet. And, they always try to solve their medical problem by getting help of Internet as I do. But, if you give a person wrong suggestion than, he can die also. So, beware of it. And, if there's a Medical Science site for people. Than, they won't have to go to Doctors most of time. Do you want to stop/kill their job? They have spend more than, 4 years to complete MBBS. Why you want to stop their job?

Advantage of Medical Science Site

As we are human being. We sometime face lot of problems which we shy to say sometimes. And, we can't solve those problem immediately and, discussion of a problem is better than, searching through online. Even, when we face problem at night we don't get support of a doctor at that time. As CD is international platform, there's lot of people from the whole world. So, if it is night here than, some user may active at that time also. So, that we can get support from peoples. And, as a side note every user should add information of what they have done on Medical Science in answer cause, as I said earlier if you give someone a wrong information than, he could die also.

As I said earlier Medical Science fit in Biology CD. So, that we shouldn't create more sites for Medical Science. Instead of creating site for Medical Science, we can propose a category in Biology. So, that we can be active in a single site. As most of our communities are inactive. So, we better fit Medical Science in Biology.

I am concerned about the ability of such a site to maintain its quality and accuracy.

This is the Internet. Even if we require sources for all information contained in posts, there are sources for every piece of misinformation out there. It's hard to tell at a glance at times what is a legitimate information source and what is spouting nonsense - which leads to things like anti-vaccine misinformation gaining popularity.

Unless you have somebody with medical training overseeing every post on the site, I don't see how it would be possible for a public medical Q&A site to keep itself free of misinformation.

Aside from misinformation, there will be the endless "What's wrong with me?" questions asking for a diagnosis, as well as being a ripe target for medical and drug spam.

I don't see this being a viable proposal at the moment, especially with such a small, non-medically-trained userbase.

Related to the proposal to introduce reactions for answers, I propose that there should be some way to rate sources of questions and answers in order to maintain quality.

This could be done as proposed in the corresponding meta post with reactions that are written along the lines "Good references" and "Bad references". However, it might be also useful to implement a per-reference way to vote so that references can be voted individually.

Oftentimes, interesting findings are scattered among several different publications in different journals so that "foul" or questionable references can find their way into a question and / or answer. Voting on the question / answer as a whole then possibly conveys the wrong meaning as it can happen that only one reference is questionable but the rest is fine.

What do you think of that?

Medical Sciences QAs is one of the best things ever happened to humanity in general ; especially when combined with AI as in Google "automatic answerer" that fits data to phrases like "Paracetamol and Ibuprofen together" or "Cannabis and Diazepam together".

Please, do it; I can assure I mean to contribute and to actively do quality assurance with the spare time I have.