Talk:The Ottawa Hospital

Ottawa Health Research Institute split

The following is a closed discussion of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the proposal was no consensus. Skeezix1000 11:47, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

User:Jpaterson created the article. I thought it should be part of this article and was bold enough to merge it in. He disagrees with me, and thinks it should be its own article. So I've put up the split notice and I'd like to know what the community would like to be done with this section. Ardenn 19:11, 21 February 2006 (UTC)

The Ottawa Health Research Institute (OHRI) is a research institute and the Ottawa Hospital is a Hospital. They are separated entities with different missions, budgets, CEOs, etc. Moreover, the OHRI is as related to the Ottawa Hospital as much as to the University of Ottawa. Moreover, there are other hospital related research insitutes that have their own wikipedia entries. See for example, University of Ottawa Heart Institute. Would you please revert your changes? Miguel Andrade 20:52, 21 February 2006 (UTC)

First I'd like to see what community consensus is. IMHO, OHRI is an arm of TOH, and thus the section belongs as part of the article. Ardenn 20:55, 21 February 2006 (UTC)

Community consensus isn't the point here. A case can be made that it should be a subsection of Ottawa U as its is an Institute of said educational facility. The majority of the Researchers are made up of Professors and students at U of O. The OHRI is also funded seperatly, has a seperate mailing address and a seperate Board of Directors. The only major connections i see between it and the Ottawa hospital are the locations of where its labs are - which makes sense - considering thats where all the patients are to conduct research on are located. I think there is case to be made for it being a subsection of either the Hospital or the University. It all depends on your priorties: its Location or who pays for the Staff. This diversity means that case can be made for it to be a seperate entry.--Mrr1979 22:49, 21 February 2006 (UTC)

I also agree that the OHRI is separate from the Ottawa Hospital with respect to Wikipedia and the use of "arm" does not accurately identify the relationship. The same case could be made for the other Institutes that are connected to the Hospital. I think a separate and identifable presence is important to those institiutes. It is a separately run "company" and shares services due to the location. Maybe the case could be made that the Hospital is the applied health science arm of the insitute? Seriously, I do think it best that it remain in Wikipedia as it was originally intended by Jpaterson. Dialdn 23:28, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

The wikipedia policy on Article size actually gives different reason to split or merge articles. Namely, is either article likely (or possibly) going to increase in length any time in the forseeable future? Also, see the wikipedia policy Wikipedia:Merging and moving pages for "good reasons to merge a page", which are:

• There are two or more pages on exactly the same subject.
  • No Andrewjuren(talk) 15:00, 12 April 2006 (UTC)
• There are two or more pages on related subjects that have a large overlap. Wikipedia is not a dictionary; there doesn't need to be a separate entry for every concept in the universe. For example, "Flammable" and "Non-flammable" can both be explained in an article on Flammability.
  • Maybe Andrewjuren(talk) 15:00, 12 April 2006 (UTC)
• If a page is very short and cannot or should not be expanded terribly much, it often makes sense to merge it with a page on a broader topic.
  • Maybe Andrewjuren(talk) 15:00, 12 April 2006 (UTC)
• If a short article requires the background material or context from a broader article in order for readers to understand it.
  • No Andrewjuren(talk) 15:00, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

Please add your thoughts on the criteria listed (I'm from B.C., so I only have the information in the articles to go by). Andrewjuren(talk) 15:00, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

In response to the above justifications for merging pages: I agree that the first and last justifications do not apply in this case. Here is my take on the other two.

• If the pages were organized correctly, there would be no overlap between the OHRI and The Ottawa Hospital pages. The only other thing about research on The Ottawa Hospital page is the Kidney Research Centre, which in fact is part of the OHRI. See http://www.ohri.ca/centres/KidneyResearch/default.asp. All research done at The Ottawa Hospital goes through the OHRI. So it makes sense to have a separate page for the OHRI, with links to and from The Ottawa Hospital.
• With respect to the size of the page, there is a very good possibility of expansion. The OHRI is currently building a world class Centre for Stem Cell and Gene Therapy, a Centre for the Prevention of Age-Related Blindness, and new space for the Kidney Research Centre. There is a strong possibility that more content could be added on these and other initiatives in the future.

Besides these standard justifications, it is also worth noting that the OHRI has its own governance structure, its own budget, its own website, its own board of directors, etc. etc. Jpaterson 13:35, 14 April 2006 (UTC).

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.