Talk:Streptomycin

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This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 24 August 2021 and 25 December 2021. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Incennative23, Meganszymanski, Buttsl3, Ty Aldridge, Jcandy9528, Jwill17.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 10:18, 17 January 2022 (UTC)

Heading

The story of the discovery of streptomycin, and in particular the question of who should have received the credit, seems quite controversial. This would probably require some editing to explain the situation better; in the meantime, the Revision as of 09:36, 3 September 2005 by User:The Phoenix seems more neutral than the subsequent revision by User:Gwax. I suggest to revert this edit until a better formulation is found. Schutz 21:37, 29 September 2005 (UTC)

Streptomycin - used in treatment for Pneumonic plague

Secondary pneumonic plague can be simplistically considered as an evolved form of bubonic plague where bacterial infection spreads to the lungs resulting in symptoms consistent with those of TB. It should be noted that the symptoms of secondary pneumonic plague are of rapid onset (2-3 days) and much higher severity than those seen in tuberculosis infection. Untreated pneumonic plague is almost uniformly fatal.

Stremptomycin has been shown to be somewhat effective in treatment - usually following use of other antibiotics such as tetracycline where treatment has been unsuccessful - possibly due to treatment being applied too late in the disease cycle.

More advanced treatments may now exist - do not use the above as medical advice - seek professional medical advice.

What does this mean ?

"However It is approved for this purpose only by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration."

Does this mean that the US FDA approves the drug for treating plague but not for any other use, or does it mean that no other authority than the US FDA approves the drug for use against plague ? g4oep — Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.96.60.31 (talk) 16:12, 30 October 2014 (UTC)

NPOV

As has already been seen, I am not neutral on the matter of this article so I won't try editing it myself but in its current state it exibits a strong bias (almost slander) against Selman Waksman and as such I have placed the NPOV tag on the page. Both the Albert Schatz and Selman Waksman pages present a more neutral appraoch to the issue. --Gwax 21:04, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

After researching this interesting story on the discovery of streptomycin for a class that I teach, I agree that the current listing on Wikipedia for streptomycin exhibits a strong bias against Selman Waksman (and as stated above, bordering on slander). The story of Selman Waksman on the Wikipedia site shows a much more balanced view of the controvery. UMIMPMI 14:51, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

I have now edited this page to present a neutral and more comprehensive discussion of this topic UMIMPMI 15:30, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

It looks good to me; I think the tag can be removed. Schutz 15:34, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

wrong chemical structure

the submitted image of the chemical structure is incorrect,the IUPAC name for streptomycin is : 5-(2,4-diguanidino-3,5,6-trihydroxy-cyclohexoxy)-4- [4,5-dihydroxy-6-(hydroxymethyl) -3-methylamino-tetrahydropyran-2-yl] oxy-3-hydroxy-2-methyl-tetrahydrofuran-3-carbaldehyde

the bold states a methyl group at the 2-position in the furan ( 5 membered one in the middle) and the image contains a hydroxyl group

The unsigned contributor above is correct. For example, see the chemical structure at http://www.bmb.leeds.ac.uk/mbiology/ug/ugteach/icu8/antibiotics/antimycobacterials.html susato 16:06, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

The depicted chemical structure has incorrect stereochemistry and is, I believe, instead the enantiomer of streptomycin, as can be seen from https://pubchem.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/compound/streptomycin#section=2D-Structure Harmonslide (talk) 04:35, 28 May 2015 (UTC)

It appears that the above issue has been corrected Harmonslide (talk) 22:13, 2 June 2015 (UTC)

No, five years later, and the structure is still incorrect. The glucose moiety shown is in the incorrect d form. Lhynard (talk) 07:11, 17 April 2020 (UTC)

Simple English Possible?

Would it be possible to make a simple english version of this... please? 72.75.102.121 16:49, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

First line for TB

Although streptomycin is not commonly used as first-line treatment for TB, this is not because it is not a first line drug! Indeed, it IS on the WHO list of first line drugs for TB. It is because streptomycin has to be given by daily intramuscular injection, which is painful and one of the major side-effects of streptomycin is permanent sensorineural deafness. If there are no objections, I will amend the article to reflect this. --Gak 02:55, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Incorrect citation

This article claims that E. coli can be resistant to streptomycin if they have an aadA gene activated, and then cites a Joung 2000 article, found at http://www.pnas.org/cgi/content/full/97/13/7382 This article makes absolutely no mention of streptomycin, but rather of resistance to spectinomycin. Spectinomycin is produced by a bacterium from the same genus as streptomycin, but not the same species. Even though spectinomycin behaves similarly to streptomycin, they have different chemical structures and I think it's an unethical extrapolation to assume that activation of the aadA gene will also create resistance to streptomycin. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 143.44.70.225 (talk) 04:55, 9 May 2008 (UTC)

I agree. I checked the citations today, and you are correct. All references that were provided in the respective section ("Bacteria selection experiments") were "Joung et al., 2000" and "Hurt et al., 2003", which is not very helpful. Fortunately, Joung is a rather rare name (as opposed to Young and Jung, of which there are thousands). PubMed lists only four articles with a Joung as first author that were published in 2000 ([1]), and the only one of them that deals with the aadA gene is the one you cited, so it is probably the one being referred to. Streptomycin is not even mentioned in the article, so I suppose the guy who wrote the section confused it with Spectinomycin, which is one of the antibiotics the paper deals with. I removed the section for this reason.

If you or anyone else discovers a similar mistake in the future, just be bold and fix it. -- Shinryuu (talk) 17:03, 25 May 2010 (UTC)

History and discussion of placebo controlled and double blind

The comments about whether or not the study was placebo controlled, double blind or fair should probably be deleted. They don't add to the article. By what criteria is it not "fair"? Franklinjefferson (talk) 04:51, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

Oral administration

"Streptomycin cannot be given orally, but must be administered by regular intramuscular injections." - Okay. So how do I have it in tablet form? Those tablets useless? Quizzically... -- 82.181.238.101 (talk) 04:29, 10 January 2012 (UTC) I think its erythromycin or neomycin

Vertigo

Is the sense that the world is spinning. It is not dizziness which is none specific and also means lightheadedness. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 03:44, 14 December 2017 (UTC)

That's true, but more than one editor has tried to change "feeling like the world is spinning" to something that sounds less ridiculous. Vertigo is fairly well known, and could be linked to for further explanation. I know that we try to over-simplify medical articles in the lead, but this is over-simplified to the extreme, and makes it look unprofessional. Natureium (talk) 15:06, 14 December 2017 (UTC)

While I would rather Wikipedia look unprofessional and people understand our content than the other way around. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 04:14, 15 December 2017 (UTC)

Have just finished an analysis of the complexity of the leads of English Wikipedia's medical articles. The are just over grade 12 (down from over grade 15 a number of years ago). Grade 12 is not exactly "over-simplified to the extreme". Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 02:02, 14 January 2019 (UTC)

Where is this analysis? How did you define "level"? What does it have to do with this particular article? 37.152.231.125 (talk) 11:07, 15 January 2019 (UTC)

The source uses "vertigo", not "feeling like the world is spinning". We have a lengthy article on vertigo, reducing it to this simple explanation is unfair to both the topic and the source. Bradv🍁 17:55, 14 January 2019 (UTC)

Typically, I prefer to use technical terms, but I have been pointed to the WP:Technical guideline more than once and have employed it at times. Whether we state "feeling like the world is spinning" or "a symptom where a person feels as if they or the objects around them are moving when they are not" (the latter being what the Vertigo Wikipedia article currently states), it's clearer for readers than stating "vertigo." Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 03:48, 15 January 2019 (UTC)

And, of course, the explanation is WP:Pipelinked with the Vertigo article, ensuring that readers can be informed of the technical term and can learn more about the subject. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 03:51, 15 January 2019 (UTC)

Of all the things to simplify in the article, this is not the right one to focus on. The source says "vertigo", and our article on the subject is also called vertigo, not "feeling like the world is spinning". Bradv🍁 03:56, 15 January 2019 (UTC)

So you'd object to us stating "a symptom where a person feels as if they or the objects around them are moving when they are not" as well? We could also state "vertigo" and have a brief explanation of what it is in parentheses, which is the style I use when I want to keep a technical term, but I and/or others feel that the term should also be briefly explained. As for titles, of course Wikipedia article titles are commonly precise and often are not descriptive. We don't go with the definition of a subject in our article titles (not usually anyway). Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 04:21, 15 January 2019 (UTC)

I would just use the word vertigo. It would be wikilinked to the article, which includes an accurate and understandable definition in its lede, for the benefit of readers who do not understand the word. There's no need to define every term in the article, and even less of a need to hide the technical term from readers. Bradv🍁 04:32, 15 January 2019 (UTC)

I agree that there is no need to define every term in the article; no one is suggesting that we do. Doc is suggesting that "vertigo" be explained because it's one of the terms readers are unlikely to understand. Some will know what it means, obviously. But is it so common of a term that readers usually know what it means? I don't think so. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 09:33, 15 January 2019 (UTC)

Yes, it is a common term which most readers would understand. In a large corpus of the English language, it occurs with similar frequency to words such as "ache", "migraine", "dizziness, "acne", etc.[2] A clear definition of it is clearly relevant in some contexts (like, its own article), and not in others (like, in the lead section of an article about a drug). Seven different users have replaced the infantile, vague, waffly "feeling like the world is spinning" with the clear, easily understood, accurate "vertigo" over the past year; one user has squatted on this article and reverted all those changes. That's a clear consensus in favour of "vertigo". 37.152.231.125 (talk) 11:07, 15 January 2019 (UTC)

reference per MEDRS 37.152.231.125?--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 13:23, 15 January 2019 (UTC)

I agree that vertigo is a common enough term that it should be used. If people feel that it warrants an explanation, a parenthetical note will do, but otherwise, linking to vertigo is sufficient. "Feeling like the world is spinning" is out of place unless we want to define every term instead of using the common word. Natureium (talk) 15:39, 15 January 2019 (UTC)

To the IP, "vertigo" is mentioned in medical sources, but it is not as common a term among the general public as "ache," "migraine," "dizziness," and "acne." I don't think most people on the street could define "vertigo" if asked to define it. But, as I mentioned, and as echoed by Natureium, a parenthetical note is a good compromise. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 20:06, 16 January 2019 (UTC)

Not as much as you might think. [3] Natureium (talk) 21:11, 16 January 2019 (UTC)

That doesn't indicate what the general public knows. There are so many terms that the general public is not familiar with on the back of medicine bottles. The general public will then Google the unfamiliar term or look into it some other way. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 04:53, 17 January 2019 (UTC) Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 04:55, 17 January 2019 (UTC)