Wikipedia contains errors in 90% of the voices that speak of health – ANSA.it

90% of Wikipedia entries relating to health topics contain errors, inaccuracies which inevitably are taken for good by the readers of the online seeking advice about their health.

And ‘the data showed U.S. study published by the Journal of the American Osteopathic Association and reported online on BBC Health. The encyclopedia ‘of all’ is a big success of the network: contains 30 million articles in 285 languages, and experts estimate that up to 70% of physicians and medical students to use.

Conducted by Robert Hasty Wallace School of Osteopathic Medicine in North Carolina, the study is based on analysis of a number of Wikipedia entries related health problems among the 10 most expensive as back pain and asthma. The Wikipedia content were compared with the official medical literature and found that in nine out of ten rumors there are errors and inaccuracies.

Hasty’s recommendation is that Wikipedia is not used by patients as a primary resource for information relating to their health problems, but that you always trust your doctor.

Wikipedia on the other hand defends himself by saying that the study examined only a few items and that in any case there are many initiatives that involving doctors and medical associations to improve the content of the encyclopedia.