Talk:Huntington's disease clinical research

Creation

I have created this article with the info in the Huntington's Disease article since there was already too much info. A summary is going to be left in the main article.--Garrondo (talk) 08:39, 16 March 2009 (UTC)

Is this article needed?

I can see why this page was created, but I don't think it's an improvement on the research section of the Huntington's disease page, but simply creates additional work because now two pages have to be maintained. This one is very out of date but editors and readers can't be expected to attend to and synthesise two pages on the same topic. I suggest deleting this article and concentrating our efforts on the main page. I will wait to hear from others here, before proposing deletion formally. Dubbin^u | t 12:17, 17 January 2012 (UTC)

I've proposed the article for deletion and notified the creator, No disrespect is intended by this nomination, and it was perfectly sensible to have created this article to see how it went. User:Garrondo. Dubbin^{u | t | c} 17:07, 20 January 2012 (UTC)

Did you email? Garrondo's not been on-wiki since last April. In any case, I'm going to tag the article with {{update}} and remove the prod. Let's see if we can simply drain the bathwater and keep the baby. LeadSongDog come howl! 19:44, 20 January 2012 (UTC)

The baby's in the main article. This article is all bathwater - it's so out of date it's misleading, and sending people from the accurate article section to it is a disservice. It hasn't had any proper updates for nearly 3 years which, when you consider how much things have progressed in the field, is outrageous. If it were going to be updated it would have been by now, and I don't think a tag will make much difference. However, I'll give it a month to see if anyone updates it before proposing an AFD.Dubbin^{u | t | c} 22:40, 20 January 2012 (UTC)

As a general rule, we prefer to fix problems rather than simply delete articles. What is it that you think is out of date? LeadSongDog come howl! 14:10, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

Just look at the section in the main article, which is fully up to date, and what's written here, to answer that question. This article's missing almost everything that's been studied since it was created in 2009 (the one exception being my mention of the failed minocycline trial). Examples - new animal models; gene silencing success in the rat and primate; the whole stem cell section is out of date and pitched wrongly; no mention of HDAC inhibition, caspases, autophagy enhancement or post-translational modification. My point is that there is no need for a detailed article on this - that's beyond the scope of Wikipedia - but a concise, up-to-date section in the main HD article is both what we need and what we've got. I'm willing to keep the HD article section up to date, but I don't have the time or inclination to maintain this unnecessary article, too. Dubbin^{u | t | c} 14:26, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

• Addendum - to show I'm not just being negative, I'd recommend these 2 review articles for anyone wishing to update the article:
  • [1] - Munoz-Sanjuan & Bates, JCI 2010 - very good review of therapeutics.
  • [2] - Ross & Tabrizi 2011 - excellent review of pathogenesis and how it can inform treatment.

Dubbin^{u | t | c} 15:15, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

• Should probably also use

• Mestre T, Ferreira J, Coelho MM, Rosa M, Sampaio C. (2009 Jul 8). "Therapeutic interventions for symptomatic treatment in Huntington's disease". Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews (3). CD006456 (Orig. rev.). doi:10.1002/14651858.CD006456. PMID 19588393. {{cite journal}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
• Mestre T, Ferreira J, Coelho MM, Rosa M, Sampaio C. (2009 Jul 8). "Therapeutic interventions for disease progression in Huntington's disease". Cochrane Database Syst Rev (3). CD006455 (Orig. rev.). doi:10.1002/14651858.CD006455. PMID 19588392. {{cite journal}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)LeadSongDog come howl! 03:35, 23 January 2012 (UTC)

• I'd say those Cochrane reviews are rather out of date now - clinical research in HD has advanced dramatically in the past couple of years - and focus too much on the question of whether things already tested in humans are effective (they're not), rather than the more interesting and important question of therapeutics in development. Dubbin^{u | t | c} 10:44, 23 January 2012 (UTC)

I'm still trying to find the dramatic advances you speak of, what am I missing? Theraputics in development that are not yet in clinical trials clearly would not meet wp:CRYSTAL in regard to an article which is about clinical research. LeadSongDog come howl! 20:13, 23 January 2012 (UTC)

Have you read the Munoz-Sanjuan paper? Successful animal trials have been carried out for many new therapeutics. Or start from scratch with the section in the main article and expand it. 'Clinical research' has to mean 'research with the aim of producing therapeutics', or this article is even less necessary than I currently think - it would otherwise be restricted to a list of negative human trials - and most of its existing content would need to be removed! But I'm not here to justify this article's existence - I think it should be deleted. If a keen editor like you can't find a way to update it, then the case for its removal is made. Dubbin^{u | t | c} 20:41, 23 January 2012 (UTC)

I've read it, though I don't claim to have entirely digested it. But the key line for the purpose of this discussion seems to be "To date, no disease-modifying clinical efficacy trials have demonstrated treatment efficacy". Our job, however, is not to invent new meanings for standard terms. Clinical research is not a synonym of drug development. That the findings of clinical research have been negative to date does not mean that it is uninteresting to readers or that there is nothing that has been said about it in MEDRS. LeadSongDog come howl! 22:28, 23 January 2012 (UTC)

So the page should consist of a sentence saying that no treatment trial has shown efficacy citing the cochrane review? Come on. Either this article should summarize clinical (i.e. treatment-related, as opposed to basic) research, or should be deleted. I favour the latter. But as garrondo created it, it was intended as an expanded form of the 'Research directions' section of the HD article. In any event since you seem unwilling to update the page yourself, if nobody else steps in, I'll nominate it for deletion since in its present form it is misleadingly out of date. Dubbin^{u | t | c} 23:09, 23 January 2012 (UTC)

Whoa,this sounds a tad heated, I'm not sure it would pass the deletion test anyway! My gut feeling is that this article is useful: Most of this section was originally a section in the main article, but it grew over time, so to help keep the main article a reasonable length it was transferred here. We could reduce the disproved theories and only leave the current ones, but I feel it is interesting to see the twists and turns research takes - usually one is just left with the final result and information is lost. I agree it is less likely that editors will keep the page updated as much as the main article, but it could grow into a useful page of its own. Maybe we should have a more obvious 'past research' section? Lee∴V (talk • contribs) 23:59, 23 January 2012 (UTC)

I have no objection to the page if it is properly maintained - an expanded version of the HD article section would be very useful. The problem is that there's no shortage of people saying it could be edited, and suggesting how this might be done, but apparently a complete absence of suitable people willing to do so. In its current form, it makes no sense to redirect people from the concise, properly referenced, comprehensive overview in the main article to this one, which is less accurate. Where are the editors who will fix this? I am a postdoctoral HD researcher but don't have the time or inclination to maintain this separate page. So, a suggestion: Why not start again, copy-paste the section from the main article into this one, and expand it using the references I've suggested above? Of course the second step will require willing editors, but at least that would rapidly bring the article up to date. Dubbin^{u | t | c} 11:16, 24 January 2012 (UTC)

No heat from my side, Lee, and I haven't sensed any from Dubbin either. We just haven't yet worked out an agreement on the right thing to do, so we're discussing it. There is, after all, wp:NODEADLINE. Additional voices will be helpful. It seems reasonable to group the past unsuccessful attempts into one section while copying the current section from the main article into another section designated for current research. LeadSongDog come howl! 14:37, 24 January 2012 (UTC)

All is cool then! The change of the link to this page on the full article from 'main article' to 'see also' makes sense, and I like the idea of using the main pages summary on this page, wrapping up the current content at the same time. Lee∴V (talk • contribs) 17:23, 24 January 2012 (UTC)

This is progress, but I don't think the proposal is quite workable yet. Almost all the current content here duplicates what's in the current main article section, but is outdated. There's not much point saying everything twice - especially if the second half is obsolete. I suggest starting with the main page summary, and archiving the current content into this talk page, then any keen editor can transfer and update anything they feel is missing. This will enable a rapid and reliable update, with the option of future expansion from the current text. Dubbin^{u | t | c} 14:45, 27 January 2012 (UTC)

Perhaps I'm not following properly. Do you mean that the main article section is also outdated? If so, I'd suggest bringing that up to date first, then clone as above, then trim the redundancies. No need to make extra copies, they're always there in the edit history. Just put a link on the talkpage to the version that was moved (for copyright compliance) and we're good. LeadSongDog come howl! 15:45, 27 January 2012 (UTC)

(outdent) I think I'm not explaining myself properly. The 'research directions' section in the HD article is fully up to date. You suggested keeping the current HDCR article as a section, and pasting the section from the HD article above it. But I don't think the current 'Clinical Research' article contains anything major that needs to be kept - everything it mentions is covered in the HD article section. But in case other editors differ, I suggested archiving it to the talk page. You're right, though, anyone who wants to can access it from the edit history. So should we just copy-paste from the HD article and let others take it from there? Dubbin^{u | t | c} 17:13, 27 January 2012 (UTC)

Well, the research article has scope for some history of unsuccessful attempts (if clearly explained as such). If you're happy with the main article section, I'll tackle the rework here. LeadSongDog come howl! 18:17, 27 January 2012 (UTC)

Voila. A starting point, at least. I think that's what we've agreed, but if not feel free to revert. Now the question is whether anyone will keep it up to date. Dubbin^{u | t | c} 19:14, 27 January 2012 (UTC)

Ok, I've pulled the history back, and recast the tense to make it clear that's what it is. It still needs some work, but it's a start. Thank you for your patience. LeadSongDog come howl! 22:31, 27 January 2012 (UTC)

Looking good guys! Lee∴V (talk • contribs) 22:34, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

On what merits does this article exist?

The previous discussion seems very dated. Almost nothing has been added to this article since 2013 and it contains very little information that couldn't fit in the original Huntington article.User:User931 12:44, 9 July 2015 (UTC)

It's gone, and I wholeheartedly endorse this action, though I didn't take it. But as the author of the Movement disorders article in one of your edit summaries, I challenge you to identify a therapeutic approach that doesn't fit into one of the three (deliberately broad) categories (lowering HTT, enhancing cell survival or replacing lost cells) :) Dubbin^{u | t | c} 10:36, 15 July 2015 (UTC)