Template talk:Infobox abortion method/Archive 1

(Copied from my talkpage David Ruben Talk 03:14, 9 February 2007 (UTC))

I've been wanting to create a template like Template:Infobox Birth control for use in articles in Category:Forms of abortion for some time now. I posted to Help talk:Infobox quite a while ago, but nothing has been forthcoming, and I still don't know what to make of the infobox creation process. Any pointers you might be able to lend would be greatly appreciated. Thanks! -Severa (!!!) 11:10, 8 February 2007 (UTC)


 * Ok not difficult. Peroposed infoboxes can be added to List of infoboxes/Proposed, which is really just somewhere for large number of editors to collaborate on an infobox development. I'm not aware that there is any formal vetting/proposing/accepting process, but it would be wise perhaps to discuss at Talk:Abortion where interested people (who contribute to articles that the infobox would apply to) can add their thoughts.


 * First though which parameters where you thinking the infobox should contain (as the proposer you can be WP:Bold and decide upon the initial suggestions)?
 * First use (anywhere) seems obvious
 * Number or fraction of all abortions is problematic (i.e. different in each country and varies over time) - or did you want such data, eg Number_US = and Date_US = with nothing shown unless a date has been provided with the number parameter. Then separate set for UK, Canada, Australia, New Zealand .... but where do we stop with including countries (Ireland, Carribean, South Africa...) ?
 * Could have an Anaesthetic parameter as to whether needs anaesthetic or not (watch the sparks fly re American or British spelling).


 * Then I can then mark up an intial proposal to put forward at List of infoboxes/Proposed and we can notify Talk:Abortion. David Ruben Talk 13:03, 8 February 2007 (UTC)


 * I'm glad to know that the infobox creation process isn't as formalized as the stub creation process.This infobox would be associated with WikiProject Abortion, so, I could also propose it there too (in fact, I already have, it just didn't go anywhere). My suggested paramaters are as follows:
 * Type of method: Surgical or medical.
 * First use: When a method was developed.
 * Last use: If the method has been phased out.
 * Timeframe of use by gestational age
 * Frequency of use: I think percentages would provide more immediate context as to how common a method was over numbers. With numbers, you wouldn't get an indication of how common a method was, in comparison to others, unless you checked other articles. As for which countries to cite, I'd say go with a few "representative" ones, perhaps the G8, or the most populous nations. An obvious criteria for exclusion would be countries in which abortion is generally illegal. I would also say that we should make note of countries that go against the general trend, that is, countries in which an abortion method is practiced more or less often than it is in other nations due to variations in laws or medicine.
 * Availability: The legality of a procedure by country and whether it is generally accessible.
 * Advantages and disadvantages
 * Potential health risks
 * Anaesthetic requirement
 * Contraindications
 * Other prohibitive or beneficial considerations (cost, invasiveness, how long a method requires to complete)
 * Maybe that's trying to cram too much information into one place? I don't know much about coding infoboxes, so I can't help you there. But I really appreciate your offer to help, because this is an improvement I've wished to see implemented on abortion articles for a long time. -Severa (!!!) 14:37, 8 February 2007 (UTC)


 * Seems sensible start. One of things that became apparent with the Infobox Birth control was that in order to try and standardise what was inserted (particularly important given contentious & disparate POVs on the topics) the parameters were quite specific (hence not just advantages or disavatanges but various parameters within each of these). So do you see the Frequency of use, Advantages & Disadvantages as just 3 free-text parameters, or each having individual parameter components within the 3 categories ? No rush to reply (I'll look back later this evening or tomorrow) David Ruben Talk 16:26, 8 February 2007 (UTC)


 * Like I said, I don't really know much about coding an infobox, so I wouldn't know how to technically construct the parameters. I think standardizing the options would be the best choice, but we should also leave room for flexibility, given that sources are going to vary. How did you do it with the Infobox Birth control - free text, or standardized parameters? Information under the "Frequency of use" parameter could be easily formatted to include the components country, percent, and year. However, I see "Advantages & disadvantages" as being a single heading, in order to prevent the need for shifting a parameter between one of either two headings, depending on the specifics of the method (for example, "Anaesthetic requirement" could be listed under either "Advantages" or "Disadvantages," depending on whether the procedure called for anaesthetic). Also, perhaps it isn't desirable to associate the term "advantage" with abortion, so maybe we should substitute the title "Heath considerations" for "Advantages & disadvantages." -Severa (!!!) 17:05, 8 February 2007 (UTC)

Scope
Obvious point is that this infobox applies only to induced abortions (i.e. deliberate terminations) rather than spontaneous abortions (aka miscarriages) (e.g. complete abortion, incomplete abortion, threatened abortion) or even nonspecific terms such as septic abortion (which is not a proceedure but a complication from any surgical approach) David Ruben Talk 03:19, 9 February 2007 (UTC)


 * Category:Forms of abortion includes Miscarriage, as well as other types which are not individual methods of induced abortion, but broad descriptions, such as Self-induced abortion and Late-term abortion. Use of this template should be limited to only specific methods: Dilation and curettage, Dilation and evacuation, Electric vacuum aspiration, Feticide, Hysterotomy abortion, Instillation abortion, Intact dilation and extraction, Medical abortion, Manual vacuum aspiration, Mifepristone, Menstrual extraction, Selective reduction, and Suction-aspiration abortion.


 * Agree with what it should apply to, but does this need be reflected in the name of the info box, e.g. "Infobox Induced Abortion" (or something similar) ? David Ruben Talk 09:53, 9 February 2007 (UTC)


 * Perhaps "Infobox Abortion Methods" would be a better template name. I can see other infoboxes being created for WikiProject Abortion in the future so we should attempt to make infobox names as descriptive as possible. -Severa (!!!) 10:02, 9 February 2007 (UTC)


 * Yes better approach at name (I also wondered about "Infobox Abortion Proceedures" or "Infobox Abortion Techniques", but perhaps these fit less well for say Medical abortion). David Ruben Talk 04:06, 10 February 2007 (UTC)


 * "Abortion methods" is a more comprehensive term, yes, because "procedure" implies surgery. Sort of like how I chose the title "Forms of abortion" because the category also had to be inclusive of miscarriage and self-induced abortion (not exactly "methods"). Also, a weird question, but is "medical abortion" the correct term for abortifacient-induced abortions — is "chemical abortion" just an informal variant? -Severa (!!!) 04:20, 10 February 2007 (UTC)


 * re Medical Abortion is indeed term used in UK, I supposed used because it is simple ("abortifacient-induced abortions" is just a mouthful and just is not going to be remembered by patients) and more because "Medical" being alternative to "Surgical". Also "Medical" suggests "medicine" meaning drug-related rather than proceedural. David Ruben Talk 04:34, 10 February 2007 (UTC)
 * I know abortion "abortifacient-induced abortion" is a mouthful. I was just using the term to clarify exactly what I meant by the terms "medical abortion" or "surgical abortion." -Severa (!!!) 16:23, 10 February 2007 (UTC)

Ideas for new fields

 * Other names: field for alternate names for a procedure, such as acronyms like "D&C" or "MVA," or informal names like "RU-486."-Severa (!!!) 04:31, 9 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Seems sensible David Ruben Talk 09:15, 9 February 2007 (UTC)
 * As many of above examples are more abbreviations than alternative names, I've tried to implement this as "AKA/Abbreviation" parameter - but "Alternative_name" or "Other_name" are other choices here.David Ruben Talk 04:36, 10 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Perhaps the top title should be bolded, to indicate it is the primary name, and the alternate names placed inside of a bracket. Otherwise we could "Other names" listed under "Background." -Severa (!!!) 16:27, 10 February 2007 (UTC)
 * OK alt name in brackets (good idea). I've also had a go at making the title a little less large with its excessive line spacing (167% previously). Template:Infobox Disease had a simpler coding for the intial header of the template and I've copied that across - let me know if you think the 95% size font is too small and we can soon enlarge it a little.David Ruben Talk 02:44, 13 February 2007 (UTC)
 * I like the smaller text. It helps streamline and compact the infobox. I also think the way the heading/subheahing is laid out now looks good. -Severa (!!!) 09:34, 13 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Description: a brief description of how the procedure is performed. -Severa (!!!) 04:31, 9 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Not generally what I've seem attempted in infoboxes - I think this is something best left in the article (thi swould duplicate the brief outlines already given in the various introductions). David Ruben Talk 09:15, 9 February 2007 (UTC)
 * New Zealand usage: The theme seems to be toward primarily Anglophone countries (Australia, Canada, U.K., U.S.). -Severa (!!!) 09:41, 13 February 2007 (UTC)
 * OK so added. David Ruben Talk 01:32, 17 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Colour scheme: The periwinkle/baby blue colour scheme in the current template is certainly pleasing to the eye, but it's the same scheme employed in Infobox Birth control, so perhaps we should select different colours to make the two boxes more easily distinguishable. -Severa (!!!) 09:41, 13 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Can of course be changed, but I do like the colour scheme. Rather more importantly deliberate induced abortions is (usually, but not always) a Birth Control method so should it not be the same colour precisely because it comes under the overall umbrella of topics ? David Ruben Talk 01:32, 17 February 2007 (UTC)
 * I suppose you're right on that regard. The colour scheme is probably too nice to part with, anyway. -Severa (!!!) 13:12, 20 February 2007 (UTC)
 * South Africa usage: Since this template already features 5/6 nations in the Anglosphere, why not? I can't think of any other template parameters at this moment, so, after adding this one, do you think we'll be ready to go live with this template? -Severa (!!!) 13:15, 20 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Ok will add ZA for South Africa parameter.David Ruben Talk 03:16, 21 February 2007 (UTC)
 * As for going live, a cautious yes... it would have been nice to have had some outside opinions (i.e. additional third parties) as to this infobox and whether it is as useful in all aspects as we think/hope...  However this has been posted at Wikiproject:Abortion (see Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Abortion) and gained no response, so yes I suspect time to Be Bold :-) As per discussion on scope above, to rename in the process to "Template:Infobox abortion method" (note that article names generally only have capitalised 1st letter and the template applies to one article/method at a time so probably use "method" rather than "methods" as one would use for a navigation box). As the real initial proposer (if you feel confident in doing so) would you like to turn it live ?
 * The description page will need to have a fully blank version to copy & paste from - i.e. clear out the mock data and I presume that as a sub-page it will transfer over on renaming the infobox iteslf (else may need to be manually done (but take care).
 * The "Wikipedia_talk:List_of_infoboxes/Proposed" will need the item removing (with an edit history noting the link to the renamed "Template:Infobox abortion method").
 * Otherwise just ask and I will happily do :-) David Ruben Talk 03:16, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

Going live
I consider myself an adherent of WP:TIMID before WP:BOLD, so, I'd prefer if we had a "dress rehearsal" before we went live with the template, in order to work out any possible remaining kinks. Would it be possible to copy the template here so that we could see what it would look like with all (or most) of the fields filled with real information on a real method (say, D&C)? This way we can get an idea of what the template will look like when it is put to use in an article. Also, I hate to ask so much of you, but seeing as how you're the one who knows about configuring and setting up an infobox, it's probably best that you set it up, rather than risk me bungling something up. :-) -Severa (!!!) 12:45, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

Ok here is for D&C - partially marked up:

David Ruben Talk 03:07, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

Template neglect
I'm sorry that I've neglected this template of late. It's slipped through the cracks in terms of what I've been paying attention to on Wikipedia, because there've been a lot of disagreements lately throughout abortion-related articles, and I've been kind of preoccupied, I suppose. Please feel free to go live with this template, David Ruben, or, if you'd like me to help, I'll be back from vacation on Sunday. Thanks! -Severa (!!!) 03:31, 16 March 2007 (UTC)