Talk:Victor A. McKusick

Comment

MI Poling (talk · contribs) has expanded the article beautifully. Just two points: (1) Some information seems to be on the basis of a personal interview. Unless this was published somewhere, it counts as original research, which is not suitable as a source on Wikipedia. (2) The comparisons with Osler are certainly correct, but not necessarily suitable for an encyclopedia article unless this comparison has been made by someone influential (e.g. the President honoring HUGO, or a Nobel Prize winner). JFW | T@lk 18:35, 26 April 2006 (UTC)

Untitled

He discovered at least one form dwarfism: Cartilage Hair Hypoplasia (CHH) aka McKusick type metaphyseal chondroplasia. I believe he also discovered another, much, much more rare kind. Both of these occur disproportionately in the Amish, whom he has studied extensively (as evidenced by the studies listed on the page). -Njyoder

Verifiability of death

I can't find any sources for his death as was added by 162.129.178.98 (talk · contribs) today. If true, a sad loss of a great man. JFW | T@lk 17:50, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

Dr. Ed Miller, the Dean at the John Hopkins University School of Medicine sent an announcement to the faculty this morning that Victor had died yesterday...Indeed a great man has gone.67.160.193.129 (talk) 23:46, 23 July 2008 (UTC) Hugh Rienhoff

Reference to Baltimore Sun article added. No doubt many more to come... Scray (talk) 03:34, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

New York Times obit added. R.I.P. (thanks for your letter). Pustelnik (talk) 15:35, 24 July 2008 (UTC)

Importance of medical genetics

According to recent reports genes are poor at predicting diease. This does suggest the question of what is the importance of the narrow field of medical genetics to the health of the general population.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/16/health/research/16gene.html

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/16/science/16prof.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=nicholas%20wade%20goldstein&st=cse —Preceding unsigned comment added by 85.183.2.51 (talk) 10:38, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

The impact of medical genetics is not limited to the nascent field of predicting disease based genetics. In any event, such a discussion probably belongs on different page, i.e. Medical genetics. Do you have a specific suggestion or correction for the Victor A. McKusick article, which is the subject of this particular Talk page? --Scray (talk) 18:25, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

I think that the point might be that medical genetics does not have so much importance for the general patient or the family practioner. We may be making a collection of hen's teeth (rare things, even when they are all added together) into something more important than they are.

The official webpage for "Mendelian Inheritance in Man"(founded by Victor McKusick), does describe the work as; "this database was initiated in the early 1960s by Dr. Victor A. McKusick as a catalog of mendelian traits and disorders, entitled Mendelian Inheritance in Man (MIM)." The point being that a "catalog of mendelian traits and disorders" does not add up to an experiment. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 85.183.2.51 (talk) 13:22, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

I know this is an encyclopedia article, but should there not be some mention of his work with HeLa, both in contacting the family and in developing the line? That seems to me to be of real import to this article given the incredible importance of HeLa in science and medicine. For a family-oriented view of his involvement, see the Skloot book, "The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks." — Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.9.113.155 (talk) 22:57, 4 October 2012 (UTC)

HeLa and McKusick's treatment of the Lacks family I'm in complete agreement with the previous comment. The New york Times has an article: A Lasting Gift to Medicine That Wasn’t Really a Gift, By DENISE GRADY, Published: February 1, 2010 that mentions some seriously questionable treatment of the Lacks family. Quoting:

"Some of the Lackses later gave blood to Hopkins researchers, thinking they were being tested for cancer, when really the scientists wanted their genetic information to help determine whether HeLa cells were contaminating other cultures. When Ms. Lacks-Pullum asked a renowned geneticist at the hospital, Victor McKusick, about her mother’s illness and the use of her cells, he gave her an autographed copy of an impenetrable textbook he had edited, and, Ms. Skloot writes, “beneath his signature, he wrote a phone number for Deborah to use for making appointments to give more blood.”

I don't think his involvement should go unnoticed. He has received a lot of recognition for his work but I am doubtful he would want his own family treated as he treated the Lackses in the process of gaining that recognition. It is unclear from the article what McKusick's role in misleading the family was, but clearly he did not hold them in much esteem. Perhaps someone who knows more about this could write on this part of his career? 85.53.130.166 (talk) 21:14, 8 August 2013 (UTC)

From this I don't think we have a clue in what esteem he might have held the family. Skloot notes that standards for clinical research have shifted dramatically over the years. McKusick is not notable because of work with HeLa cells; rather, he's notable for Mendelian Inheritance in Man and its descendent, OMIM. Any vilification would need to be strongly supported in secondary sources (not a monograph, whether in the NYT or a book). -- Scray (talk) 01:25, 9 August 2013 (UTC)

citations

The biggest problem with this article is the lack of citations. Once the existing information is properly cited, the the article, and starting with the information regarding his medical career, should be added to and organized better. LRoskes (talk) 15:46, 3 March 2015 (UTC)

Article format

The citations/references in this article are a mess. There are way too many references listed for the minimal citations footnoted throughout the article. In-text citations (footnotes) can make the article more credible and also make it easier to find relevant external sources.

Also, there are numerous points when the article slips into an editorial format rather than encyclopedia format. The early life and medical career sections should be rewritten in order to make sure that the correct Wikipedia format is followed. At other points the article is very repetitive and sentences can be taken out to keep the article as succinct as possible. Jdeales1 (talk) 17:54, 3 March 2015 (UTC)

New potential bibliography

Victor McKusick reviews the progress of the genetic journal Mendelian Inheritance in Man.

Victor McKusick's study of inheritance in the Amish.

Press release from Johns Hopkins Medicine regarding Victor's death.

National Institutes of Health profile.

New York Times article regarding Victor's death.

Jdeales1 (talk) 15:08, 10 March 2015 (UTC)

References

Proposed revisions to article

New lead section

Victor Almon McKusick (October 21, 1921 – July 22, 2008), internist and medical geneticist, was University Professor of Medical Genetics and Professor of Medicine at the Johns Hopkins Hospital, Baltimore, MD, USA. He was a proponent of the mapping of the human genome because of its use for studying congenital diseases. He is well known for his studies of the Amish and of what he called "little people". He was the original author and, until his death, remained chief editor of Mendelian Inheritance in Man (MIM) and its online counterpart Online Mendelian Inheritance in Man (OMIM), a database of heritable diseases and genes. He is widely regarded as the father of clinical medical genetics. McKusick also served as editor-in-chief of the journal Medicine.

As part of a course, we intend to refurbish this article by changing the lead section as shown above, and adding subsections to make the organization more clear. We also intend to add references and make sure that the whole article is properly cited

LRoskes (talk) 19:24, 24 March 2015 (UTC)

Peer Review

I would suggest making the death section a fourth sub section of personal life instead of a stand alone large section. Apatera517 (talk) 02:53, 8 April 2015 (UTC) The "organizations" section is pretty short, perhaps you could put this information under the "career" section instead. Aflynn2 (talk) 02:55, 8 April 2015 (UTC)

Hi guys! This page is coming along nicely. I have one suggestion: if possible, I think it would be helpful to add a little more information to the "Education" and "Family" sections. Other than that, just keep adding any information you deem necessary. Great job! Ahong11 (talk) 18:23, 29 April 2015 (UTC)

PEER REVIEW

Hey guys: I think that you could possibly add a bit more information in the education section- what was mckusick's major? did he participate in any extracurricular activities? In the section talking about his publications, you could maybe talk about each of the publications in a bit more detail- add a couple of sentences describing the main points of each one. I also think that you could add a bit more information in the "see also" section talking about what that link leads to (a couple of sentences about what the mckusick- kaufman syndrome was). Rschwa99 (talk) 01:56, 1 May 2015 (UTC)

Suggestions for the Article

Overall I think this is a good article that has a lot of good information. One thing I think you could improve on is his education section. Maybe talk a little bit about his time at Tufts as an undergraduate and at Johns Hopkins Medical School. Also you have a lot of information about his publications in the research section. I think it would be better if you made another section for works that he published since you have so much information about it. Also maybe add other research project that he worked on in the research section. Cstauch1 (talk) 17:26, 1 May 2015 (UTC)

Peer Edit

This is a great article! I think you definitely have enough material and the overall structure is very good. There were only 2 things that really caught my eye. I think some sub-headings the medical career section would help give a sense of structure to that specific section. Also, I would pull the death section to either after the research section or the awards section. Good luck with the finishing touches! Rserafi2 (talk) 21:28, 4 May 2015 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 128.220.159.83 (talk)

Peer Review

This article looks great! I'm not sure that the background information on McKusick's parents is necessary. In the section on his studies of the Amish, you could list the top one or two reasons why McKusick thought studying the Amish was advantageous. Aflynn2 (talk) 18:07, 5 May 2015 (UTC)

Peer Review

Looking good! I'd say that the second part of the article is very comprehensive and well cited, however the first part, the one on his Personal Life, seems to not have enough information in comparison. I understand that that is not where the focus should be, but then maybe delete the sub-sections? If they're only one or two sentences each, I don't think they're necessary unless you continue adding information to those (which is what I recommend). Aside from that, looks great! (Amunizr1 (talk) 21:50, 5 May 2015 (UTC))

Peer Review

This article is coming together very well! I would work on the "Personal Life" section a bit more. It is lacking information compared to the other sections. It may be better to get rid of some of the subsections and create a larger section. Also, I have seen pages where "Death" is included at the end of the article, so maybe you want to consider that as well. Other than that, good job! Devynbell114 (talk) 22:45, 5 May 2015 (UTC)

Peer Review

I think that overall the article is much better referenced than it was at the beginning of the semester and the only thing I would suggest is to add some more information to the personal section or to merge some of the subheadings because a few are small. Apatera517 (talk) 16:39, 6 May 2015 (UTC)

Peer Review

The article looks great! I love the sub headings and structure. Splitting up the larger paragraphs would be effective and maybe adding a legacy section as he certainly has a legacy. Sdoman1 (talk) 21:41, 7 May 2015 (UTC)

Peer Review

Fantastic article! I have some small changes, but not too many. The summary paragraph seems a bit choppy in structure; most of the sentences begin with "He" which sounds a bit awkward if you read it aloud. Maybe you could smoothen that out a bit by varying sentence structure. At the beginning of his Hopkins section, his trip to Copenhagen doesn't seem to fit well with the rest of the information. I'm sure it does fit historically, but maybe you could make that link between his Copenhagen meeting and his Hopkins career a bit stronger. His Medical Career section can get a bit confusing since it's not completely in chronological order. The Organization section could be distibuted across his Medical Career section based on the time he was involved with it. Also, small, but I'm pretty sure the building pictured is actually called the Miller Building. I work there haha. Maybe it's a specific floor in the building? Something to look into. Overall, this page is great though! Aneekpatel (talk) 21:44, 7 May 2015 (UTC)

Peer Review

I don't see much that needs to be added to this article at all. The structure and information is well thought out and back up with evidence. I especially like how you listed the main awards he won but still gave an external link to the countless awards he won throughout his medical career. Jtino55 (talk) 03:13, 8 May 2015 (UTC)

Peer Review

This article is very well written and covers a lot of information. I think that adding a section about his research and publications' effect on the medical field today would be very interesting and show the readers why he was such a significant figure. The substantial amount of resources also shows the credibility of this article. Nice work! Cduke15 (talk) 03:39, 8 May 2015 (UTC)

Peer Review

Good work! my only suggestion would to be to split up the personal life section into two or three sections, one of which being early life. Other than that it looks great. Awesome job!128.220.159.83 (talk) 03:43, 8 May 2015 (UTC)