Wiki Education, a nonprofit organization dedicated to building connections between universities and Wikipedia and other Wikimedia projects in the United States and Canada, recently announced that UC San Francisco Health Sciences Professor Amin Azzam, MD, will lead its inaugural Medical Community Advisory Committee. The committee, which brings together seven educators from across health professions fields, will advise and engage with Wikipedia to improve its coverage of health-related topics as part of a two-year initiative to improve students' coursework across health care professions.
“The sheer number of eyeballs looking to Wikipedia for health-related information is staggering,” said Azzam, who, in addition to his role with the UCSF Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, is a faculty member at Samuel Merritt University and the UC Berkeley School of Public Health. “Helping health professions school faculty to implement Wikipedia editing assignments into their local contexts is far more impactful than my direct teaching of my own students. Getting this information on Wikipedia will help everyone who reads Wikipedia for their own or their loved ones’ health.”
During their two-year term, committee members will collaborate with Wiki Education across key areas of the project, including outreach and recruitment. Working with Wiki Education staff, the scholars will expand faculty awareness of the Wikipedia assignment through outreach to health professions networks, partnership development with organizations and institutions, and support for Teaching with Wikipedia webinars.
“Ever since taking a Wikipedia-editing course as a medical student, I’ve been passionate about improving health-related content on Wikipedia; whether through designing courses or encouraging colleagues to get involved,” said second-year ophthalmology resident and committee member Tolga Guven, MD. “I firmly believe in the open-access movement and that motivation should be the only barrier to acquiring knowledge. The opportunity to work alongside and learn from like-minded educators while helping improve one of the world’s most-referenced information sources was one I couldn’t resist.”
The group will also assist with a study led by Azzam to investigate the impact that editing Wikipedia has on health professions student editors. Committee members will support survey design and focus group framework development.
“This work excites me for two main reasons: one, the educational opportunity it presents for health professional students; and two, its potential to improve public health,” explained fellow committee member Sheila Kusnoor, PhD. “Participating in Wikipedia editing courses gives students the chance to learn how to identify high-quality evidence and clearly communicate it to a lay audience. These skills are critical, as patients need access to reliable, easy-to-understand health information to make informed decisions about their care. Enhancing the quality of health information on Wikipedia can help empower patients with the knowledge needed to improve their health.”
Joining Azzam on the Medical Community Advisory Committee are:
- Mohammad Aldalou, MD, postdoctoral scholar, University of Alabama at Birmingham Marnix E. Heersink School of Medicine
- Tanya Cupino, MD, PhD, Loma Linda University
- Scott Ewing, DO, Texas Christian University Burnett School of Medicine and the University of North Texas Health Science Center Texas College of Osteopathic Medicine
- Tolga Guven, MD, Wessex Deanery
- Sheila Kusnoor, PhD, Vanderbilt University Medical Center
- Maureen Richards, PhD, University of Illinois College of Medicine Rockford Campus
The project is funded through a Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI) Eugene Washington PCORI Engagement Award (EADI #38991).
About UCSF Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences
The UCSF Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences and the Langley Porter Psychiatric Institute are among the nation's foremost resources in the fields of child, adolescent, adult, and geriatric mental health. Together they constitute one of the largest departments in the UCSF School of Medicine and the UCSF Weill Institute for Neurosciences, with a focus on providing unparalleled patient care, conducting impactful research, training the next generation of behavioral health leaders, and advancing diversity, health equity, and community across the field.
UCSF Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences conducts its clinical, educational, and research efforts at a variety of locations in Northern California, including the UCSF Nancy Friend Pritzker Psychiatry Building; UCSF Langley Porter Psychiatric Hospital; UCSF Health medical centers and community hospitals across San Francisco; UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospitals in San Francisco and Oakland; Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital and Trauma Center; the San Francisco VA Health Care System; UCSF Fresno; and numerous community-based sites around the San Francisco Bay Area.
About the UCSF Weill Institute for Neurosciences
The UCSF Weill Institute for Neurosciences, established by the extraordinary generosity of Joan and Sanford I. "Sandy" Weill, brings together world-class researchers with top-ranked physicians to solve some of the most complex challenges in the human brain.
The UCSF Weill Institute leverages UCSF’s unrivaled bench-to-bedside excellence in the neurosciences. It unites three UCSF departments—Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Neurology, and Neurological Surgery—that are highly esteemed for both patient care and research, as well as the Neuroscience Graduate Program, a cross-disciplinary alliance of nearly 100 UCSF faculty members from 15 basic-science departments, as well as the UCSF Institute for Neurodegenerative Diseases, a multidisciplinary research center focused on finding effective treatments for Alzheimer’s disease, frontotemporal dementia, Parkinson’s disease, and other neurodegenerative disorders.
About UCSF
The University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) is exclusively focused on the health sciences and is dedicated to promoting health worldwide through advanced biomedical research, graduate-level education in the life sciences and health professions, and excellence in patient care. UCSF Health, which serves as UCSF’s primary academic medical center, includes top-ranked specialty hospitals and other clinical programs, and has affiliations throughout the Bay Area.
