Da Costa's syndrome is common in civilian life, and it can be genetic or run in families, and two thirds of the patients are women, and some were former sportsmen and athletes. Less than 1% would have been to war, and most of the patients who developed the condition during war already had minor symptoms before enlisting, and some were volunteers. According to J.M.DaCosta's original research paper the cause was excessive physical exertion, particularly excessive marching in 34.5% of cases, which was the largest group. It was more likely to develop if the person was marching long distances while being poorly fed and suffering from a viral infection. My two critics were trying to argue that it is a 'post-war syndrome', and that it is the result of the fear of exercise, and the fear of battle, and that there isn't any physiological explanation for the symptoms, and they give that impression by deleting most of the information that I provided.

Some years ago I became aware of a medical condition that was widely accepted as being caused by stress or anxiety. There was also the idea that some of the patients had many illnesses during their childhood and were mollycoddled and given excessive sympathy by their mothers, so it was thought that they developed a 'learned illness behaviour' pattern and that when they became adults their minds developed the symptoms, or the actual disease in order to get that sympathy. Other researchers considered the possibility of a virus being the cause but despite extensive investigations they couldn't find any scientific evidence to prove it, or cure it, so the patients suffered from chronic pain, anxiety, and depression.

The name of that ailment was peptic ulcer disease. In the 1980's two researchers named Barry Marshall and Robin Warren discovered that the ulcers were actually caused by an acid resistant bacteria and then they developed an antibiotic treatment which cured 90% of cases in a week.

Another condition which was regarded as having the same sort of origin was Da Costa's syndrome, however the cause has not yet been found. I wrote an article about it for Wikipedia based on the history of the different ideas and findings. During that process I had two critics who arranged for that article to be deleted and for me to be banned.

The reason for people having 'closed minds'

There were some researchers who studied the history of peptic ulcers and would mention the case of a nineteenth century man who was shot in the stomach and lived, and the bullet wound healed in such a way that it left a clean hole in his stomach which scientists could look through.They observed changes in the color of the lining of his stomach whenever he was under stress, which led to the development of the idea that stomach ulcers were due to the effect of stress and excess stomach acid. People generally became so convinced about that idea that ever since then any other suggestions were liable to be regarded as non-mainstream or fringe medicine of doubtful value. It was also thought that it was completely impossible for a virus to live in stomach acid, so any suggestion of a viral cause was likely to be ridiculed.

There are some people who have closed minds and don't want anyone to read anything except their own ideas so when I wrote about ALL of the history of Da Costa's syndrome my two critics deleted everything that shed doubt on their own point of view.

You can read the lead up to that banning below, followed by the article that I wrote here.

"Da Costa's Syndrome is a type of anxiety disorder first observed in soldiers in the American Civil War. It causes symptoms similar to heart disease but, upon examination, nothing is found to be physically wrong with the patient. The symptoms usually consist of fatigue upon exertion, combined with shortness of breath, palpitations, sweating, chest pain, shaking, and, less commonly, fainting. The symptoms may increase whilst exercising, and it is thought to be caused partly by hyperventilation.

Related: Neurasthenia, Orthostatic intolerance, Hyperventilation syndrome, Chronic fatigue syndrome, Soldier's heart.

This disease article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it."

My contributions to the Wikipedia Da Costa's syndrome page started smoothly, but after I added information about my own research my contributions were continually disrupted by the same two editors, namely WhatamIdoing and Gordonofcartoon. I was initially told that I had taken up too much space with that research so I abbreviated it, but that attempt to comply with advice and policy was completely ignored and the information was deleted again, so I haven't put it back since.

I then began adding to the history section of the topic, but each time I did my critics accused me of violating a never ending series of policies. However, I checked the Wikipedia guidelines and found that most of what I added from independent peer-reviewed journals was exactly what policy required, but that didn't stop my two critics from finding fault with them. They just found newer policies or sub-clauses of policies as their excuse for deleting anything that didn't agree with their point of view. In particular, they systematically deleted the most important scientific discoveries of the physical causes of each of the four main symptoms. To read some of the discussions related to these deletions you can scroll down the Da Costa's syndrome talk page here and the User talk page here, and the recently deleted section here..The disruptions continued from December 2007 to May 2008 when I was topic banned, and then until January 2009 when I was banned from Wikipedia.

During that time I was being criticised on a "Request for Comments" page where it was suggested that the dispute could be resolved if all interested editors wrote a separate page of information so that neutral editors could later combine them to provide one unbiased article. My two critics refused to co-operate with that process, but I notified the other editors that I would need a few weeks to prepare an article, and ultimately posted it onto the subpage in Wikipedia.

The initial response of a neutral editor named Avnjay was that it complied with all of the policies, and there was no bias, and that it was already "a lot better" than the existing one. I then began co-operating with Avnjay on improving it and continued until he advised me that he would be busy on other private activities for awhile. see here

I responded to the outstanding requests for comments or references and completed the essay a few months later. As it was the only one written I used it to replace the Wikipedia topic page that readers see. I did that four times between 25-1-09 and 27-1-09. On the first occasion it was deleted within eight hours by one of my critics so I replaced it and he deleted it again, and it was reverted the third and fourth times by the other critic, and each time they replaced it with a few paragraphs that were consistent with their own bias.

The article that I transferred to the topic page can be seen here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Da_Costa%27s_syndrome&diff=266713530&oldid=266577085

My critics replaced it with a reduced and edited version e.g. on 27-1-09 here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Da_Costa%27s_syndrome&diff=266787024&oldid=266755214

The article that I wrote can also be seen on the website of another internet encyclopedia called Wikisage here http://en.wikisage.org/wiki/Da_Costa%27s_syndrome

The full text that I wrote is also shown below. M.B.

Contents
1 Da Costa's Syndrome

2 History
2.1 1864-1899
2.2 1900-1919
2.3 1920-1949
2.4 1950-1999
2.5 2000-2008

3 Symptoms
4 Predisposing factors
5 Onset of symptoms
6 Causes
7 General Physical Characteristics
8 Physiological Abnormalities related to exertion
9 Treatment
10 Alternative names for Da Costa's syndrome
11 Differential Diagnosis
12 Related Conditions
13 See Also
14 Portrait of a typical Da Costa's syndrome patient
15 References

Da Costa's Syndrome

Da Costa's Syndrome is a disorder of unknown origin[1][2][3] which involves a set of symptoms that include left-sided chest pains, palpitations, breathlessness, faintness, dizziness and fatigue occurring exclusively in response to physical exertion in some patients,[4] but in most cases the symptoms occur to a lesser degree at other times. The tendency to excessive tiredness during the day, and a reduced capacity for exertion[5][6], are the most prominent complaints.

The condition was first identified by J.M.DaCosta who observed it in soldiers during the American Civil War and later studied 300 patients to distinguish it from heart disease which has similar symptoms.[7] Since then there have been many heated disputes and controversies[1][8][2][9][10] about it being heart disease or not[1], real or imaginary[1][11], genuine or malingering[12], and physical or mental[13], and more than 80 different theories and labels have been proposed and scientifically investigated[14][15]. Da Costa called it "irritable heart" but the most appropriate label according to Harvard professor Paul Dudley White, who studied the subject for more than 50 years, was neurocirculatory asthenia.[1] Other authors have regarded Da Costa's syndrome as the best name because it does not give any attribution to hypothesised cause and is therefore the most objective term.[11]

The typical patient is a sedentary worker with a long, thin, flat, or narrow chest, and a stooped spine, as depicted in a life sized portrait which was previously displayed in the Museum of the Post-Graduate Medical School of London[16]. Notable medical authority Oglesby Paul summarised many of the Da Costa controversies in a 1987 edition of the British Heart Journal[2] and since then the use of the term has become rare and, although the ailment is still a common and easily diagnosed problem, it has been absorbed into other modern categories of labelling. The abnormal response to effort is consistent with the modern equivalent of effort intolerance which is a symptom of a type of postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome which is a sub-type of the chronic fatigue syndrome[17] [1] [18]. Other popularly used labels included soldier's heart, effort syndrome, anxiety neurosis,[1][2] and post-viral fatigue syndrome.[15] All modern ideas about cause and labelling have their strong adherents and opponents, however, none have yet been scientifically proven or universally accepted.

History

1864-1899
Da Costa's syndrome is named after the surgeon Jacob Mendes Da Costa, who first observed it in soldiers during the American Civil War. The typical case was the civilian who enlisted in the army and was sent on long hours of marching, often up to twenty miles in one day, sometimes at double quick pace, with poor food and water, and in bad weather. They developed a viral infection and diarhoea and became exhausted and fell out of line and were hospitalised for treatment. After several months they recovered from the infection but when they returned to marching they were unable to keep up the pace as before and were again hospitalised, and although making a partial recovery they continued to suffer from abnormal palpitations, breathlessness and fatigue in response to mild exertion and were unfit for full military duty. Da Costa also noted that the pulse was always greatly and rapidly influenced by position, such as stooping or reclining.[7]
Another physician, Earl de Grey, had previously presented four reports on British soldiers with these symptoms between 1864 and 1868, and attributed them to the heavy weight of military equipment being carried in knapsacks which were tightly strapped to the chest in a manner which constricted the action of the heart. Also in 1864, Henry Harthorme observed soldiers in the American Civil War who had similar symptoms which were attributed to "long-continued overexertion, with deficiency of rest and often nourishment", and indefinite heart complaints were attributed to lack of sleep and bad food[19]. In 1870 Arthur Bowen Myers of the Coldstream Guards also regarded the accoutrements as the cause of the trouble, which he called neurocirculatory asthenia and cardiovascular neurosis[20][21][22][23].

1900-1919
In 1916 Sir James MacKenzie chaired a major medical conference aimed at gaining a better understanding of the condition[12]. He attributed the fatigue to the abnormal pooling of blood in the abdominal and peripheral veins during exertion, which reduced blood flow to the brain. He also observed that the soldiers were fit and well at the start of the war, but after becoming severely exhausted by long marching or viral infections they recovered partially but with a reduced capacity for effort. They experienced abnormal palpitations and breathlessness which impaired their capacity to run fast, or to run up and down stairs, or to keep up with their comrades in marches as before.[23]
Between 1916 and 1919 several synonyms were used to describe Da Costa's syndrome in World War 1, including soldier's heart and neurocirculatory asthenia. Sir Thomas Lewis gave it the title of the effort syndrome [24]because he observed that in some cases the symptoms occurred exclusively in response to physical exertion. Many of these patients had poor physiques with narrow or flat chests and a history of minor symptoms of the condition prior to enlisting in the army, and they often came from sedentary occupations which they chose because of difficulties in doing strenuous work. They had also avoided vigorous sports for similar reasons[4]. Some of them enlisted several times and were repeatedly rejected but persisted until they were finally accepted, and then their symptoms were aggravated or caused by strenuous exertion at training camps, or while on long marches where they contracted viral infections, and after recovering from the fever they found that they could not sustain their former levels of activity. Graded exercise testing was used to gauge the severity of their condition, and both Lewis and Osler used it as a treatment[25][4][26] which enabled some of the soldiers to return to full military duty, but others were put on light duties or discharged. After the war they generally changed to lighter occupations than they had before the war, and some were chronically incapacitated by their fatigue[4].

1920-1949
In 1939 J.L. Caughey Jnr. reviewed the literature of internal medicine on the subject of cardiovascular neurosis which referred to cases that involved symptoms similar to those of heart disease occurring where there was no apparent disease of the heart or blood vessels. The typical patient had his tonsils and appendix removed as a child, as well as many infectious illnesses and colds. He had a thin physique, and a weak stomach, and his kidneys had been damaged by Scarlet fever, and there were frequent fluctuations in the color and volume of his urine. His blood pressure was unstable, and his peripheral circulation was poor, with pale fingers and toes in cold weather. He had difficulty with concentrating and thinking clearly and had a poor memory. They had a respiratory infection three years prior to suffering from pain in his heart, shortness of breath, dizziness, faintness and weakness. All of his symptoms were "made worse by exertion or nervous strain". They often felt breathless and would complain of not being able to expand their chest far enough to get a full breath. Caughey also noted previous exercise tests which indicated "a physiological abnormality in the patient as compared to the normal person", but he believed that it was due to their fear that exercise would cause a heart attack. In describing the lack of stamina he suggested that there were two groups of patients, the first who never developed the ability to persevere against the challenges and adversities of life, and those who tried but gave up.[27]
In the 1940's there were several studies aimed at determining the physical basis of these conditions[11][28] and in 1947 S.Wolf studied the "respiratory distress characterized by inability to get a full breath" and found that the thoracic diaphragm function was abnormal, and when the diaphragms contractile state during inspiration was such that adequate inspiration was no longer possible, breathlessness occurred with a feeling of inability to take a full breath. The spasm of the diaphragm was often accompanied by pains in the chest and shoulder, occlusion of the lower end of the esophagus, and difficulty swallowing.[29] Also in 1947 a report by Cohen and White noted that the complete mechanism of Da Costa syndrome symptoms was unknown but when respiration was investigated objective abnormalities were found, "just as when other symptoms of N.C.A. are investigated with objective methods, which demonstrates that the abnormalities are not all in the subjective sphere". The respiratory abnormalities at rest were few but during exercise the abnormalities became more pronounced and the deviations from the normal became greater as the rate and amount of exercise increased.[30]

1950-1979
In 1950 Edmund Wheeler presented the results of a 20-year longitudinal study of 173 patients with "effort syndrome" and found that the condition involved varying degrees of disability but all patients tended to improve with a low-stress lifestyle. He concluded that, although they all had what was called 'anxiety', they did not develop a higher frequency of illnesses such as peptic ulcers, diabetes, or asthma etc, "which have recently been said to be caused by anxiety" and that "there is no evidence that anxiety causes these diseases".[13]

In 1951 the fourth edition of Paul Dudley White's book "Heart Disease" contained a chapter on "Neurocirculatory Asthenia", because, as he explains, the symptoms are similar to heart disease, but are not the same, and he adds, that they are also similar to, but can occur in the absence of anxiety, and are not exactly like those produced by effort in a normal healthy person, and therefore need to be discussed separately.
He describes the typical group of symptoms which are precipitated by excitement or effort, and stated that "it constitutes a kind of fatigue syndrome" and in some cases "it is more or less a chronic condition," and that regardless of it's pathogenesis it was a real illness. In some patients the neurocirculatory symptoms were most prominent, but for some unknown reason there were other cases where the main symptoms were gastrointestinal or cerebral. The general causes of the condition appear to include such strains as worry over business, social, or family matters, emotional conflicts, physical or nervous fatigue, and exhaustion from acute infections or illnesses. The organic basis was not known although the possibilities which had been considered in the previous 25 years, included thyrotoxicosis, low-grade infection, adrenal hyperactivity, hyperventilation resulting in alkalosis, and lack of salt, but none have been confirmed. Many of the patients had thin physiques with an "unusually vertical position of the heart", and "abnormality of shape of the capillary loops at the base of the nail" . . . "It is common to find that close relatives have had similar problems, and recent studies indicated that it was one of the Mendelian dominant group of inherited disorders." It was common in World War 1, occurred in civilians as well as soldiers, and it is generally seen in young adults, but can occur at any age, and is more common in women than men. The frequent sighing distinguishes the condition from heart disease, and the fatigue sometimes produces more incapacity, and even complete disability. It is a real and not an imaginary incapacity, even though at first glance it may have appeared imaginary in World War 1 (1914-1918) when it was sometimes labelled "malingering", and even though in civilian practice it has frequently been diagnosed as "mere nervousness". It is milder in civilian life than in war and it is so commonly associated with psycho-neurosis of the anxiety type "that the two conditions have sometimes been confused one for the other or considered to be synonymous, the term anxiety neurosis having come to mean for many the same collection of symptoms which identify neurocirculatory asthenia."
Treatment involves rest for days or months or as long as required, and elaborate psychotherapy is generally not needed. "The condition must be discussed seriously, not lightly as if it was of no importance", and it is equally wrong to dismiss it as negligible or imaginary, as it is to to regard it as dangerous or serious and a threat to life which demands bed rest. Management of the symptoms involves normal but quiet work and play and the avoidance of long working hours or burdensome tasks. Like most people these patients usually try to keep up with their friends in strenuous living in the business, professional, or social world but with clear medical advice they soon learn the benefits limiting their activities and gradually adjust them to suit their symptoms, and are surprised at recapturing a feeling of well being."[1]
In 1956 Paul Wood's 2nd edition of Diseases of the Heart and Circulation included a chapter on the effort syndrome. He described how it "is characterised by a group of symptoms which unduly limit the subject's capacity for effort" and recorded that "The cardinal symptoms" of irritable heart, soldier's heart, disordered action of the heart (D.A.H.), etc. are "breathlessness (93%), palpitations (89%), fatigue (88%), left inframammary pain (78%), and dizziness (78%), or syncope (fainting) (35%)". He also suggested a variety of methods for diagnosing the difference between the symptoms and those of heart disease. For example the chest pain usually involved a sharp stabbing sensation in the lower ribs caused by prolonged poor posture. He noted that the location of the pain was so near the heart that "it seems to convince the patient that his heart is diseased", especailly because of the palpitations that occur at other times. It was natural to draw that conclusion but some patients developed a morbid fear of heart disease and death, however, although the exact mechanism was not known, it could be "immediately abolished by the intramuscular injection of 2 ml. of novocaine at the site of maximum intensity and tenderness", indicating that it was in the muscle between the ribs and was related to fibrositis. The breathlessness involved frequent deep sighs brought on by exercise, but were also common at other times, and the patients will say they are not able to obtain a full and satisfying breath. This can also occur at night when it "may be confused with asthma. "A simple test" for the symptom involves forced hyperventilation where "The patient is asked to breath deeply and rapidly for one minute." When a healthy person is asked to stop he feels breathless for about 20 seconds, but a patient with Da Costa's syndrome "continues forced breathing, explaining later that he felt breathless." i.e. there is an abnormal breathing pattern - "Dyspnoea" instead of insufficient breathing - "apnoea". Also "Normal subjects have no difficulty holding the breath for at least 30 seconds, but patients with Da Costa's syndrome usually give up very quickly. With regard to the fatigue the patients often do not feel refreshed when they wake up in the morning, and they may "feel tired and listless during the day". The other type of fatigue which is related to effort involves a delay in the return of pulse rate after exertion.[16]. In considering the influence of psychological factors he noted that the similarity of the symptoms to heart disorders may be the cause of a fear of heart disease (cardiophobia), which contributes to the reluctance to exercise (i.e. resulting in exercise phobia), and that all of the symptoms may have originated from a general anxiety neurosis resulting from genetic or familial factors, or poor health during childhood, and the consequent lack of exercise and the avoidance of sport during childhood.
In 1976 Charles Wooley presented an article about the history of Da Costa's syndrome in the journal called 'Circulation'. He reported that Da Costa originally called it 'irritable heart' when he noticed the condition amongst soldiers during the American Civil War. However he added that a later study by Thomas Lewis revealed that most of the soldiers who had the problem came from sedentary occupations and "a large percentage" were "affected by the condition in civil life many years before joining the Army" and that it was not particularly a soldiers malady, and that it also affected some athletes. A further study in 1941 by Paul Wood reported that it was commoner in women[11].
The author also noted that possibly several distinct, but similar conditions were causing confusion in diagnosis, and concluded that many of Da Costa's original patients had been described as having occasional cardiac sounds and murmurs that could now be included in the newly evolving category of mitral valve prolapse syndrome. He then recommended deferred judgement about the nature of the other cases, where advances in technology were likely to provide a more precise understanding of the relationship between the various causes [31].

1980-1999
In 1980 Soviet researcher V.S.Volkov studied the physical fitness levels of patients with angina heart disease, and compared them to those with neurocirculatory dystony (Da Costa's syndrome). He divided heart disease patients into three groups with heart pain at rest, heart pain every day, and heart pain occasionally. He also divided NCD patients into three stages of mild, moderate, and severe. 80% of Da Costa's syndrome patients were fitter than heart disease patients, but 20% were not, and had to stop the exercise because of changes in their heart rate, or overwhelming and radiating chest pain, general fatigue, and fear for their hearts.[32]
In 1987 prominent Harvard researcher Oglesby Paul presented a ten page history of Da Costa's syndrome in the British Heart Journal, in which he outlined all of the controversies of the previous hundred years. He reported that many theories and labels had been proposed, but for each one which had supporting evidence, there were other studies which contradicted the findings. For example, if one study presents anxiety as a cause, another study will find patients who are not anxious, another study will report hyperventilation as a cause, yet there will also be studies which show patients who don't hyperventilate, and for each study that shows a relationship to mitral valve prolapse syndrome there will be others that show no evidence of MVP. He concluded that the condition still existed, and was easy to diagnose, effecting 4% of the population, but that there were newer more popular labels, such as 'anxiety state', where he added that such labels would do no harm as long as the important history of the subject was not forgotten.[2]
In 1998 David Streeten presented an article in JAMA[3], explaining that the fatigue reported by Da Costa and Lewis were early descriptions of a "newly recognised" delayed form of orthostatic hypotension which is a feature of some types of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. He stated that "as a working hypothesis", the fatigue was due to abnormal pooling of blood in the lower limbs which delayed and reduced the flow of blood and oxygen supply to the brain. That effect was compounded by a reduced circulating red blood cell mass. He then emphasised that it is essential to identify these physical abnormalities by repeatedly measuring the patients blood pressure in recumbency and after standing for ten minutes or tilt testing, and that "it is inappropriate to consider that CFS is a manifestation of mental disorder" unless those physical causes are excluded. He added that the expense of these tests was not unreasonable considering that almost every type of work or lifestyle required a person to stand for six hours per day without experiencing the symptoms associated with reduced blood pressure. He then concluded that the instigating cause remains unknown, and that effective and safe treatments for the debilitating symptoms are still not available and that further research is required.[3]

The relevance to modern labelling terminology between 2000-2008
The use of the term Da Costa's syndrome has fallen out of fashion and is rarely used nowadays,[2] however to put it into context with modern labels there are some relevant descriptions from the history of research. In that regard, in 1916 Thomas Lewis noted that in some cases the condition was exclusively related to exertion,[33] [5][4] and in 1956 Paul Wood O.B.E. described it as a syndrome of six clearly identifiable symptoms which had previously been called "primary"[12] "typical" [34] "characteristic"[35] "chief"[24][36] , or "classic"[1] and which he called "cardinal" symptoms[16]. Harvard professor Paul Dudley White described it as a definite malady which was a type of fatigue syndrome that is more or less chronic.[1] Nowadays those typical, distinct, or characteristic features can be seen in conditions which include the symptom with the misnomer of effort intolerance (which should be effort limitations) due to exercise induced postural hypotension.[23][16][37] For example, it is seen in one type of the Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome, which is in turn one of the many types of chronic fatigue syndrome[17] [3][37][38][10] [39][18]. However, there are still many different ideas about cause, and the condition has been virtually lost in a sea of other labels[5][2][40] and although there is a vast amount of direct and indirect research evidence for physical cause[29][30][34], none have been universally accepted[14]. The topic remains the subject of ongoing controversy amongst imprecisely defined anxiety disorders, poorly characterised post-war syndromes[41][42][43], and the complex CFS group of ailments[41][44][45][46][38][37][37][38], Opinions differ from one medical specialist to another[17][10][18], from one medical authority to another, and from one medical consumer group to another, and change regularly[44][15][18]. Dictionary definitions and label priorities also alter with the changes in opinion, however the Merriam Webster online Medical Dictionary [2] includes a definition of neurocirculatory asthenia, with the typical symptoms occurring in relation to exertion and in the absence of heart disease, and provides the synonyms of "cardiac neurosis, effort syndrome, irritable heart, and soldier's heart" [47], which were the most frequently used synonyms for Da Costa's syndrome.[1][2] Indeed Dorland's medical dictionary lists Da Costa's syndrome and neurocirculatory asthenia as direct synonyms[48] and the current 2008 edtion of Harrison's Principles of Internal Medicine describes the symptoms of the modern term chronic fatigue syndrome as being "not new" with the comment that in the past it may have been diagnosed as the "effort syndrome"[17] defined in 1919 by Lewis[25][4].

Symptoms
The typical symptoms of Da Costa's syndrome are palpitations, breathlessness, chest pains, and or fatigue[16][34][49][12] occurring exclusively in response to physical exertion in some cases[4][16][6], and occasionally to changes in posture[33][50][12], but in many patients they are also associated with some viral infections or nervous strains.[1][27]

* The palpitations occur as a more forceful and rapid beating of the heart than usual and are generally associated with stress or exertion[4][1].

* The breathlessness is related to spasm and inefficient function of the thoracic diaphragm[29][11][28][30] which is the primary breathing muscle, and it features occasional slow, forced, deep breaths - abnormal sighs or yawns[27][50][14][30][1][5][11][34].The person often feels as if they cannot get a full breath, and they tend to avoid crowded buses, trains and theatres, and they prefer to sit near open windows to get fresh air, or in aisle seats so that they can leave the room quickly if necessary, and in some cases they avoid open spaces where there are crowds. This was due to an abnormal build up of CO2 exhaled by the crowd in a confined space, which tended to increase the frequency of sighs and ultimately cause all of the physical symptoms of the condition, and sometimes a sense of suffocation and a sense of fear that resembled anxiety attacks[14].

* The most common chest pain is a dull ache or tenderness in the lower left side of the chest[24][36] with occasional brief, sharp and stabbing sensations in that area[4][1][5][14][11][16][2][34], and there may sometimes be cramping pains in the muscles on the far left or right side of the chest brought on by muscualr efforts [11][16][1]such as the strain of "lifting a heavy weight", especially at awkward angles - "in such actions as cranking an engine" [11][16].

* The fatigue involves two distinct types. Firstly an abnormal pattern of tiredness with the person often waking up tired in the morning[8], and feeling tired at various times throughout the day[35], and secondly, an increased frequency of sighing, or gasping breathlessness and exhaustion as the level of physical exertion increases[24], and it is unlike normal fatigue insofar as it tends to persist abnormally despite rest[5]. It is related to abnormal pooling of blood in the abdominal and peripheral veins which reduces blood flow to the heart and brain[4][38] , especially during exertion, which explains why faintness and dizziness are often additional features, and why most patients have a reduced capacity for exertion.[23][16][3][17]

* The faintness or giddiness can often occur when standing up quickly, especially when getting out of bed in the morning[33], or after a large meal[33], or when standing still for many hours on a hot day, or sometimes by bending or stooping[24], or by being moved on a swingboard[24] or tilt table[37], and is related to the abnormal distribution and movement of blood throughout the body[24][33].

Predisposing factors
The condition may be genetic or familial[11][35][30][16][13][27][34][2] and is more likely to affect individuals who had multiple infectious illnesses and surgical procedures during childhood[4][27], and who had thin[23][51][1][52] and stooped physiques[24][53][11] [31][1][34], and sedentary workers[4][33][54] who avoided or never played sport[4][27][1][16][31], and it is more common in women[4][14][13][11][1][34][2][39][18], and often occurs or starts during a pregnancy[13][14][55]. Most soldiers who developed the condition were former sedentary workers[24][33] who had minor indications of the typical symptoms prior to the war[7][4][33][54][51][14][35][31], and were volunteers rather than conscripts[33][36], and it was more common in the army where strenuous marching was required, and less common in the navy and airforce[36].

Onset of symptoms
In some cases the condition appears to have been present since birth, or ever since the patient can remember[27][51][30][13][35], but it is often gradual in onset without the patient noticing it or being able to identify an obvious cause[14], or it may start and recur or persist after a viral infection[7][23][4][14][16][2], or after an excessive or prolonged period of physical[7][4][14][54][41] or emotional stress[19][13][1]. The average age of onset is 25 years[35][14][34].

Causes
According to J.M.Da Costa in his original paper of 1871 the causes were "Fevers" 17%, "Diarrhoea" 30.5%, "Hard field service, particularly excessive marching" 34.5%, and finally, "Wounds, injuries, rheumatism, scurvy, ordinary duties of soldier life, and doubtful causes" 18%.[7][12]
Since Da Costa's initial report several authors have proposed that bad work posture[12], compression of the chest with tight straps[12], work involving severe muscular exertion[12], anxiety[1][2][48] related to personal or business stress[13][16][1], pregnancy[13][14] and malnutrition[19][1][14][41] can be added to the list of causes.

General Physical Characteristics
Da Costa's syndrome can affect individuals of any type of physique, but they are generally thin[23][25][33][35][51][1][52], with various chest wall deformities and stooped or scoliotic spines[24][4][33][31][11][16][34]. They are generally, but have not always been poor athletes and swimmers[33][30][14], and have an abnormally functioning thoracic diaphragm which results in inefficient breathing and the tendency to sigh more often than usual. They also have a reduced capacity to hold their breath[4], and an intolerance to carbon dioxide where deliberately overbreathing, or breathing CO2 enriched air brings on their symptoms[14][56][2], as does wearing a gas mask[31][11][30] and the infusion of sodium lactate[34]. Other common distinguishing features are abnormalities in the shape of their fingernail capillaries,[1][11][34] and it is very common to find dermatographia[24] where running a finger nail lightly down the chest will leave a trailing red mark and hence the ability to write on the skin.

Physiological Abnormalities related to exertion
Da Costa's syndrome has been called "the physiological syndrome of effort"[33][54] and the patients have a poor aerobic capacity or low level of fitness which is not related to the lack of exercise[25][4], and they have breathing patterns and other symptoms which are not the normal response to effort[50][14][30][1][5][11][2]. They have poor diaphragm movement and reduced chest expansion at rest[27][11], and during exercise training such as walking, jogging, or running "they have an easily induced oxygen debt"[1], their breathing become disproportionately shallow, oxygen consumption is lower, and blood lactate levels are higher than normal[14][30][34][12], in some cases more than double[14], and as the intensity and duration of the exercise increases the physiological abnormalities increase[24][14][30] which is consistent with the histories and claimed disabilities of these patients[50][14]. There is also an abnormal pooling of blood in the abdominal and peripheral veins[23][25][3][38] , and a slow return of pulse rate to normal after exertion[24][33][54][16].

Treatment
The reports of Da Costa, White, Wheeler, and Wood etc. show that patients recovered from the more severe symptoms when removed from the strenuous activity, the stressful emotional situations, or the sustained lifestyle that caused them[19][33][13][1]. In many cases relapses were prevented by determining the limits of exertion and lifestyle and keeping within them[24][13][1][57][44]. The physical limitations were associated with the abnormalities in respiration and circulation, and exercise testing and blood CO2 measurements can be used to accurately estimate the degree of disability for up to 20 years later[50]. The treatments evident from the previous studies included appropriate levels of exercise where possible[23][26][1][2][58], using individually designed graded exercise regimes[24][50][33][59][41][9][6][34][49] which have been proven to be effective in relieving symptoms and improving exercise tolerance in come cases[50][12][17]. Some symptoms such as faintness can be prevented or relieved by wearing loose clothing about the neck, chest, and waist[7][20][12], and standing up slowly can prevent the faintness associated with postural or orthostatic hypotension in some cases[16][17], and avoiding postural changes such as stooping, or lying on the left or right side[7][24][33][11][12], or the back relieved some of the palpitations, chest pains, or giddiness in some cases. Some of the symptoms can be relieved by laying in a recliner chair[59], and the chest pain can be temporarily relieved by intramuscular injection of novocaine at the site of tenderness[16]. Other treatments were improving nutrition[19][33], physique and posture,[7], and drinking more fluids, increasing salt intake, and sleeping with the head elevated which can reduce the fatigue[60][61][38]. It is also useful to reassure the patient that the condition is not due to heart disease and that many individuals manage the symptoms successfully by making appropriate modification to their exercise levels and lifestyle, and generally have a normal lifespan[33].

Prevention
In his original paper J.M. Da Costa suggested that the condition tended to become chronic after a prolonged and exhausting viral infection where the person was sent back to full and demanding activity too soon. He therefore recommended that the person should be provided with sufficient rest, nourishment, and gradual physical training to achieve full strength before resuming former duties[7][2][33]. Various other authors have suggested that the adoption of a moderate lifestyle and avoidance of the extremes can prevent this type of condition from developing[33][13][1][57], and that this general principle applies regardless of other causes and pathogenesis[62]. As the result of research in World War 1, the World War 2 army recruits with evidence of symptoms in civilian life were excluded from joining, and the incidence durding the war decreased significantly[8].

Alternative names for Da Costa's syndrome
The name of Da Costa's syndrome has changed so often[36] from one specialist[5][14][34], or from one country[32][44] [12][18], or one year to another[14][44][18] that it has created confusion in the definition, diagnosis, and study of the condition,[33][31] as is evident from many research articles which mention four or five in their introduction,[27][50][30][14][1][16][56][34][31][63][61][6][12][41][45][18] [17] and from a recent website which lists what it claims are more than eighty synonyms.[15] However the title of Da Costa's syndrome has been regarded as the preferred label by several authors because of its non-attribution and unchallengable aspect.[11] By contrast, the labels such as irritable heart or cardiac asthenia are inappropriate because the ailment is not a form of heart disease[1]. Similarly labels such as Soldier's heart or Combat fatigue are too specific[36][2] and can be challenged because the vast majority of patients have never been soldiers,[1] and it is inappropriate when the symptoms occur in pregnant civilian women[64][11]. Relating it to Post-viral fatigue syndrome[17] can be disputed because, in many cases the patient could not recall having a viral infection, and the label of Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) can be challenged because many patients have not experienced preceding trauma,[13][2]and the symptoms are not the same as those caused by stress[14] and can have a genetic[35][30] [34][31][2][45], or gradual onset unrelated to stress [30]. Somatoform disorder refers to symptoms occurring in the absence of physical or physiological evidence to account for them [3], yet Da Costa's symptoms have actually been called "the physiological syndrome of effort"[33], and have been associated with multiple physical, physiological and biochemical abnormalities[24][33][50][54][51][30][16][32][2][12][45][18], and the term dysautonomia implies a fault in the autonomic nervous system which, whilst it may be an effect, and has not been proven as a cause[1][11][16][2][39]. There are also discrepancies associated with the label of Hyperventilation syndrome [1][16][2][65] with some evidence that the abnormal breathing patterns, which may include hyperventilation, are secondary to the other symptoms and physiological abnormalities[8][56]. Similarly, some patients with MVP have none of the symptoms of Da Costa's syndrome and vice versa[2][57]. The term anxiety state implies that the patient is in a constant state of anxiety, yet many patients appear calm and are rarely affected by anxiety[30][57][38], and the term anxiety disorder can be disputed[57] because the symptoms are not the same as those produced by anxiety[33][14][1]and they don't develop any abnormal incidence of other diseases such as peptic ulcers or asthma which have been previously, and erroneously attributed to anxiety[13][2]and labelled as psychosomatic[34]. Similarly the condition cannot be regarded as an exercise phobia because many patients were capable of strenuous marching prior to developing the condition [7] or were formerly good athletes[24][51], and in fact, it has previously been called "Athlete's Heart"[33]. However, by referring to the ailment as Da Costa's syndrome it can be said that it may be related to anxiety, excessive physical or emotional stress, post-viral causes, and unknown causes etc. The symptoms can include orthostatic hypotension and postural tachycardia[38][18] but those terms are not appropriate as labels because they don't account for the other symptoms. Da Costa's could be referred to as a type of Chronic fatigue syndrome,[1][62][3][44][45][39][10][18][17] because chronic fatigue is the main symptom, but the other five typical symptoms distinguish it from the general term [4], and from other types of CFS[44].

Differential Diagnosis
The condition needs to be distinguished from angina heart disease (angina pectoris), mitral valve prolapse syndrome[9], hyperventilation syndrome, hyperkinetic heart, cardiophobia[2], normal tiredness[5][35] the normal symptoms of exertion[33][5][30][1], normal nervousness[1], exercise phobia, panic attacks, anxiety state, and depression, and other similar syndromes such as the the post-traumatic stress disorders and the numerous post-war syndromes.[2]. It also needs to be distinguished from other types of orthostatic hypotension [38][39][18] or chronic fatigue syndromes[10] , which involve separate or different, or additional symptoms. However many patients with Da Costa's syndrome also have such problems as a coincidence or as a result of the ailment. For example patients who have symptoms similar to heart disease, often develop a fear of heart disease (cardiophobia)[16][2] Also note that Da Costa's syndrome involves a set of six classic symptoms, and needs to be distinguished from conditions that involve only one or two symptoms[34]. For example hyperkinetic heart may occur on its own as a single symptom, or it may be part of the set of six in a Da Costa's patient[63][2]. Similarly a person who only has a dual combination of the left-sided chest pain and palpitations does not necessarily have Da Costa's syndrome. Also, characteristically Da Costa's syndrome involves fatigue which includes both an impaired capacity for exertion[24][26][17], and secondly, an abnormal pattern of tiredness[5]. Therefore, if patients do not have difficulty with exertion they do not have Da Costa's syndrome,[7] e.g. a person who complains of abnormal tiredness but participates in vigorous sport does not have Da Costa's syndrome.
The history of this condition clearly and precisely defines the "primary" [12] and "typical" [34]symptoms as "DaCosta's" "chronic" "fatigue" "syndrome"[1], which distinguishes it from many other definitions or types of CFS.

Related Conditions
Chronic Fatigue Syndrome
Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome [37]
Soldier's Heart
Chest Wall Syndrome
Costochondritis - left-sided chest pain
Sigh Syndrome
Exercise Intolerance
Mitral Valve Prolapse Syndrome

Portrait of a typical Da Costa's syndrome patient
[16] click here ( I asked the editors to put a copy of this photo on the page in Wikipedia but it wasn't, so I have linked it to the same photo on my website)

References
1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z aa ab ac ad ae af ag ah ai aj ak al am an ao White, Paul Dudley (1951). Heart Disease. New York, New York: MacMillan. pp. 578-591.
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z aa ab ac Paul O (1987). "Da Costa's syndrome or neurocirculatory asthenia". Br Heart J 58 (4): 306­15. PMID 3314950.
3. ^ a b c d e f g Streeten, David H.P. (September 1996). "The Nature of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS)". J.A.M.A. 280 (12): Editorial. Retrieved on 4 October 2008.
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t Lewis T. (1919) The soldier's heart and the effort syndrome, Paul B. Hoeber, New York.
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Baker, Doris M. (1955). Cardiac Symptoms In The Neuroses. London: H.K.Lewis & Co.,Ltd.. pp. 50.
6. ^ a b c d Wooley M.D., Charles F. (2004). "Early Hospitals Devoted to Heart Disease: Military Heart Hospital at Hampstead, England: World War 1". American Heart Hospital Journal 2: 175-177. Retrieved on 8 November 2008.
7. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Da Costa, Jacob Medes (January 1871). "On Irritable Heart". The American Journal of the Medical Sciences: p.18-52.
8. ^ a b c d [|White, Paul Dudley]; Helen Donovan (1967). Hearts Their Long Follow-up. Philadelphia and London: W.B.Saunders Company. pp. 300-308.
9. ^ a b c Wooley, Charles F.; J.M.Stang (August 1990). "Samuel A Levine's first world war encounters with Mackenzie and Lewis". British Heart Journal 64 (2): 166-170. PMID PMC1024362. Retrieved on 8 November 2008.
10. ^ a b c d e Wooley, Charles F. (2002). The Irritable Heart of Soldiers and the Origins of Anglo American Cardiology: the U.S. Civil War (1861) to World War 1 (1918). Aldershot U.K.: Ashgate Publishing. pp. 321 pp.. ISBN 0-7546-0595-7 (h/b).
11. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u Wood, Paul (24 May 1941). "Da Costa's Syndrome (or Effort Syndrome)". British Medical Journal 1(4194): 767­772.
12. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q Howell, Joel (1985). ""Soldier's heart": the redefinition of heart disease and speciality formation in early twentieth-century Great Britain.". Medical History: Supplement No. 5:34-52.
13. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Wheeler E.O. (1950), Neurocirculatory Asthenia et.al. - A Twenty Year Follow-Up Study of One Hundred and Seventy-Three Patients., Journal of the American Medical Association, 25th March 1950, p.870-889 (Contributors to the study: Edwin O.Wheeler, M.D., Paul Dudley White, M.D., Eleanor W.Reed, and Mandel E.Cohen, M.D.)
14. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z Cohen ME, White PD (1951). "Life situations, emotions, and neurocirculatory asthenia (anxiety neurosis, neurasthenia, effort syndrome)". Psychosom Med 13 (6): 335­57. PMID 14892184. Retrieved on 28 May 2008.
15. ^ a b c d "The disease of a thousand names". Retrieved on 2008-10-02.
16. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x Wood, Paul (1956). Diseases of the Heart and Circulation 2nd. revised edition. London: Eyre & Spottiswoode. pp. 937-947.
17. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Fauci, Anthony S.; et al. (February 2008). Harrison's Principles of Internal Medicine 17th edition. New York U.S.A.: McGraw-Hill Companies Inc.. pp. 2703=2704.
18. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Lu, Chih-Cherng; et.al (2004). "Orthostatic Intolerance: Potential Pathophysiology and Therapy". Chinese Journal of Physiology 47 (3): 102. Retrieved on 3 November 2008.
19. ^ a b c d e Hartshorne, Henry (3 June 1863). "On heart disease in the army". College of Physicians, Philadelphia.
20. ^ a b Myers, Arthur (1870). On the etiology and prevalence ofdiseases ofthe heart among soldiers,. London: Churchill.
21. ^ Goetz, C.G.; Turner C.M. and Aminoff M.J. editors (1993). Handbook of Clinical Neurology. B.V.: Elsevier Science Publishers. pp. 429-447.
22. ^ Goetz, C.G.; Turner C.M. and Aminoff M.J. editors (1993). Handbook of Clinical Neurology. B.V.: Elsevier Science Publishers. pp. 429-447.
23. ^ a b c d e f g h i Mackenzie, Sir James; R.M.Wilson, Philip Hamill, Alexander Morrison, O.Leyton, & Florence A.Stoney (1916-01-18). "Discussions On The Soldier's Heart". Proceedings of the Royal Society of Medicine, Therapeutical and Pharmacological Section 9: 27-60.
24. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s [|Lewis, Thomas] (1918). The Soldier's Heart And The Effort Syndrome. London: Shaw & Sons. pp. 144 pages.
25. ^ a b c d e Lewis, T. (1918). "Observations upon prognosis, with special reference to a condition described as the "irritable heart of soldiers"". Lancet i (181-3).
26. ^ a b c Osler, Sir William (1918). "Graduated exercise in prognosis. Letter.". Lancet (1): 231.
27. ^ a b c d e f g h i Caughey, J.L. Jnr. (April 1939). "Cardiovascular Neurosis; A Review". Psychosomatic Medicine 1 (3): 311-324.
28. ^ a b Cohen, Mandel E.; R.E. Johnson, F.C. Consolazio, P.D. White (1946 Nov.). "Low oxygen consumption and low ventilatory efficiency during exhausting work in patients with neurocirculatory asthenia, effort syndrome, anxiety neurosis". Journal of Clinical Investigation 25 (6): 920.
29. ^ a b c Wolf, S. (1947 November). "Sustained Contraction of the Diaphragm, the Mechanism or a Common Type of Dyspnoea and Precordial Pain". Journal of Clinical Investigation 26: 1201. Retrieved on 23 March 2008.
30. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q Cohen, Mandel E., Paul D. White, (May 1947). "Studies of Breathing, Pulmonary Ventilation and Subjective Awareness of Shortness of Breath (Dyspnea) in Neurocirculatory Asthenia, Effort Syndrome, Anxiety Neurosis". The Journal of Clinical Investigation 26 (3): 520-529. Retrieved on 4 February 2008.
31. ^ a b c d e f g h i Wooley M.D., Charles F. (May 1976). "Where are the Diseases of Yesteryear?". Circulation (the official journal of the American Heart Association 53 (No. 5): 749-751. Retrieved on 24 September 2008.
32. ^ a b c Volkov, V.S. (1980). "Psychosomatic Interrelations and their importance in patients with cardiac type type NCD" (English abstract). Soviet Medicine (11): 9-15.
33. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z aa [|Lewis, Sir Thomas] (1937). Diseases of the Heart 2nd edition. London: MacMillan and Co., Limited. pp. 96-99 & 159-164 & 280-287.
34. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t Hurst, J.W.; R.B.Logue, R.C.Schlant, N.K.Wenber (1974). The Heart 3rd. edition. New York: McGraw Hill Book Co.,. pp. 1552-1555.
35. ^ a b c d e f g h i Cohen, Mandel E.; Daniel W.Badal, Alice Kilpatrick, W.Reed, and Paul D.White (June 1951). "The high familial prevalence of neurocirculatory asthenia, anxiety neurosis, effort syndrome". American Journal of Human Genetics 3 (2): 126-158. PMID PMCID: PMC1716324. Retrieved on 2 December 2008.
36. ^ a b c d e f Gordon, Keith (April 1944). "Effort Syndrome - Editorial". Canadian Medical Association Journal 50 (4): 362-363. PMID PMCID: PMC1581613. Retrieved on 14 December 2008.
37. ^ a b c d e f Raj, Satish R. (2006). "The Postural Tachycardia Syndrome (POTS): Pathophysiology, Diagnosis & Management". Indian Pacing Electrophysiology. Journal 6 (2): 84-99. Retrieved on 28 October 2008.
38. ^ a b c d e f g h i Rowe, P.C. (April 2002). "Editorial: Orthostatic Intolerance and Chronic Fatigue Syndrome: New Light On An Old Problem". Journal of Pediatrics 140 (4): 387-389. PMID 12006948. Retrieved on 31 October 2008.
39. ^ a b c d e Stewart, Julian M.; Amy Weldon (May 24th 2000). "Vascular perturbations in the chronic orthostatic intolerance of the postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome.". Journal of Applied Physiology 89: 1505-1512. Retrieved on 8 November 2008.
40. ^ Nixon, G.F. (June 1994). "Effort syndrome: Hyperventilation and reduction of anaerobic threshold". Journal of Applied Psychophysiology and Biofeedback 19 (2): 155-169. doi:10.1007/BF01776488.
41. ^ a b c d e f C.Hyams, M.D., Kenneth; et.al (September 1996). "War Syndromes and Their Evaluation: From the U.S. Civil War to the Persian Gulf War". Annals of Internal Medicine 125 (5): 398-405. Retrieved on 2 December 2008.
42. ^ Engel CC (2004). "Post-war syndromes: illustrating the impact of the social psyche on notions of risk, responsibility, reason, and remedy". J Am Acad Psychoanal Dyn Psychiatry 32 (2): 321­34; discussion 335­43. PMID 15274499.
43. ^ Clark MR, Treisman GL (eds.) (2004). Pain And Depression: An Interdisciplinary Patient-centered Approach (Series: Advances in Psychosomatic Medicine, vol. 25). Basel: Karger. pp. 176. ISBN 3-8055-7742-7.
44. ^ a b c d e f g Ware, Norma C. (1998). "Sociomatics and Illness Course in Chronic Fatigue Syndrome". Psychosomatic Medicine 60: 394-401. Retrieved on 28 November 2008.
45. ^ a b c d e Online 'Mendelian Inheritance in Man' (OMIM) Orthostatic Intolerance -604715
46. ^ Schondorf, R.; R.Freeman (1999). "The importance of orthostatic intolerance in the chronic fatigue syndrome". Am.J.Med.Sci. 317: 117-123. PMID 10037115.
47. ^ "Merriam-Webster Medical Dictionary". Retrieved on 2008-06-10.
48. ^ a b "Dorlands Medical Dictionary:Da Costa syndrome". Retrieved on 2008-10-06.
49. ^ a b Fleming, P.R. (1997). A Short History of Cardiology. Amsterdam and Atlanta: Clio Medica, Wellcome Institute. pp. 159.
50. ^ a b c d e f g h i Whishaw, R. (December 16th 1939). "A Review of the Physical Condition of Returned Soldiers Suffering from the Effort Syndrome". The Medical Journal of Australia: 891-893.
51. ^ a b c d e f Jones, Maxwell; R.Scarisbrick (1946). "The effect of Exercise on Soldiers with Neuro-circulatory asthenia". Psychosomatic Medicine (8): 188-192. Retrieved on 2 December 2008.
52. ^ a b Linford Rees, W. (1945). "Physique and Effort Syndrome". Journal of Mental Science 91: 89-92. doi:10.1192/bjp.91.382.89. Retrieved on 14 November 2008.
53. ^ Lewis, Sir Thomas (1940). The soldier's heart and the effort syndrome 2nd. edition. London: Shaw.
54. ^ a b c d e f Wittkower, E.; J.P. Spillane (Feb. 1940). "Medical Problems in War - Neuroses in War (The Effort Syndrome)". The British Medical Journal: 266 & 308-310.
55. ^ Reid, D.E.; M.E.Cohen (1950). "Evaluation of present day trends in obstetrics". J.A.M.A. 142: 615.
56. ^ a b c Morgan, W.P. (Sept. 1983). "Hyperventilation syndrome: a review". American Indian Hygiene association Journal 44 (9): 685-689. Retrieved on 5 November 2008.
57. ^ a b c d e Lewis, R.P.; C.F.Wooley, A.J.Kolibash and H.Boudoulas (1987). "The mitral valve prolapse epidemic: fact or fiction". Transactions of the American Clinical and Climatological Association 98: 222-236. Retrieved on 17 November 2008.
58. ^ Goudsmit EM, Howes S. "Pacing: A strategy to improve energy management in chronic fatigue syndrome", Health Psychology Update (BPS), 2008, 17, 1, 46-52
59. ^ a b Selian, Neuhoff (1917). "XX". Clinical Cardiology. New York: MacMillan. pp. 255.; cited on "Da Costa's Syndrome". vlib.us. Retrieved on 2007-12-18.
60. ^ MacLean, A.R.; Allen E.V. (1940). "Orthostatic hypotension and orthostatic tachycardia: treatment with the "head-up" bed". J.A.M.A. 115: 2162-7.
61. ^ a b MacLean, A.R.; Allen E.V., Magath T.B. (1944). "Orthostatic hypotension and orthostatic tachycardia: defects in the return of venous blood to the heart". American Heart Journal 27: 145-163.
62. ^ a b Rosen, S.D.; J.C. King, J.B. Wilkinson, & P.G.F. Nixon (December 1990). "Is chronic fatigue syndrome synonymous with effort syndrome?". Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine 83: 761-764.
63. ^ a b "The Hyperkinetic Heart". The Lancet 318: 967. October 31st. 1981.
64. ^ Hamilton, B.E.; K.J.Thomson (1941). The Heart in Pregnancy and the Childbearing Age. Boston: Little, Brown and Company.
65. ^ Saish, S.G.; A. Deale, W.N. Gardner, & S. Wessely (June 1994). "Hyperventilation and chronic fatigue syndrome". The Quarterly Journal of Medicine 87 (6): 373-374. Retrieved on 22 March 2008.

During a Requests for comments discussion two neutral editors recommended that all editors involved in the Da Costa's dispute should do a separate page of their own, so that the independent editors could later combine them to ensure neutral point of view. My two critics flatly refused to co-operate with that intelligent way of removing bias from the article. However I did produce a page and a neutral editor wrote these words to one of my critics whose Wikipedia code name was WhatamIdoing

"Hello WhatamIdoing! . . . To be honest, in my opinion, it's actually a lot better and far more detailed than the one that is currently up and I can't find anything which is COI, unsourced (97 different sources quoted!!), or biased" at 10:51, 5 October 2008 here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:WhatamIdoing/Archive_2#Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment.2FPosturewriter . . .

In other words the neutral editor was saying that the page that I produced was "a lot better", in all respects, than the version preferred by my two critics.

Within 6 hours WhatamIdoing started criticising every detail and cut and pasted the page and subjected it to more than 80 critical comments, and prompted Avnjay to try and resolve the issue by asking me to supply more references, so I did. In particular I provided more modern ones, and many to show that there was widespread agreement in the medical community that Da Costa's syndrome was an early name for the chronic fatigue syndrome. Note that I was not giving my opinion anywhere, but providing references from many independent, reliable, and verifiable sources that complied with the requests that were made, and Wikipedia sourcing policy.

However, WhatamIdoing was so biased and prejudiced that the criticisms simply became more hostile and finicky with everything I added, and was misrepresenting the facts on the arbitration page. Ultimately, one of WhatamIdoing's friends interrupted the arbitration process and broke all the rules to ban me.

The following paragraph is a direct quote from original subpage that I prepared, and WhatamIdoing's criticisms were added at 21:21, 5 October 2008, so I have highlighted them in red . . .

"Harvard[Unimportant detail added to push POV] professor Paul Dudley White described it as a definite malady which was a type of fatigue syndrome[Formatting wrong] that is more or less chronic[Formatting wrong].[1] Nowadays those typical, distinct, or characteristic features can be seen in conditions which include the symptom with the misnomer of effort intolerance (which should be effort limitations) due to exercise induced postural hypotension.[11] For example, it is seen in one type of the Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome, which is in turn one of the many types of chronic fatigue syndrome.[3]" . . .
"Da Costa's can however be referred to as a type of Chronic fatigue syndrome,[1][verification needed][original research?][18] because chronic fatigue is the main symptom, but the other five typical symptoms distinguish it from the general term, and from other types of CFS.

Reference number 1 was White, Paul Dudley (1951). Heart Disease. New York, New York: MacMillan. pp. 578-591, and reference number 18 was Rosen, S.D.; J.C. King, J.B. Wilkinson, & P.G.F. Nixon (December 1990). "Is chronic fatigue syndrome synonymous with effort syndrome?". Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine 83: 761-764." see here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:WhatamIdoing/Sandbox&diff=prev&oldid=243268880#The_relevance_to_modern_labelling_terminology_between_2000-2008

Note that I provided two references to verify the information, but WhatamIdoing ignored that and added "verification needed" anyway, and that the research was done by Harvard professor Paul Dudley White who studied the subject for fifty years and reviewed the history of it in his book, so it was not "original research" because I didn't do the research, and Paul Dudley White was not doing original research but was commenting on the general findings of many researchers, but WhatamIdoing called it "original research" anyway.

Also I added at least 8 references to show that there were many researchers who regarded Da Costa's syndrome as a type of Chronic Fatigue syndrome, and I found a comment by one of my critics which referred to it as a historical version of ME, which is an abbreviation for Myalgic Encephalomyelitis/CFS, which is widely regarded as the main type of CFS. see item 63 here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Conflict_of_interest/Noticeboard/Archive_23#Da_Costa.27s_syndrome

In response to all of the criticism I only used references which complied with Wikipedia policy which requires that a person should always verify their text with references from top quality journals and it gives the "Journal of the American Medical Association" as an example. The guidelines also suggest avoiding original research, and prefers "secondary sources" which are reviews of studies. The basic reason is that the people who administer those journals are top quality researchers who ensure that the information is as accurate and reliable as possible before publishing it.

Here are the details of one of the references that I used; The Nature of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS); Editorial / Journal of the American Medical Association v.280, n.12, 23sep98. David H. P. Streeten, MB, DPhil, Department of Medicine, State University of New York Health Science Center, 750 E Adams St, Syracuse, NY 13210

Here is the quote from that reference, and note that it is supported by other references which give a direct link to Da Costa's syndrome . . ."Fatigue is a prominent accompaniment of a wide range of disorders, including acute or chronic infections, end-stage neoplasia, renal insufficiency, congestive heart failure, and some psychiatric illnesses. It has been speculated that the severe fatigue associated with neurocirculatory asthenia, termed irritable heart syndrome by Da Costa1 and soldier's heart by Lewis2 during World War I, were early descriptions of the symptoms of orthostatic hypotension.3 The common experience of severe fatigue after prolonged, exhausting physical labor or exercise and the muscular symptoms that sometimes accompany chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) have stimulated research on the possible role of muscular disorders in its causation, but with unconvincing results. And, of course, a viral origin has been commonly considered to be a likely cause of chronic fatigue for many years."

Further down the page these words were written . . . "In 1992, Streeten and Anderson reported that the most common and most distressing symptom associated in 6 of 7 patients with a newly recongized form of orthostatic hypotension delayed form evident only after standing for more than 10 minutes was sever fatigue that improved by reducing orthostatic hyptension with fludrocortisone acetate"

Toward the end the following words were written . . . "These finding suggested, as a working hypothesis, that the combination of delayed orthostatic hypotension (caused by demonstrably excessive orthostatic pooling of blood in the lower limbs) associated with reduced circulating erythrocyte mass was causing fatigue in some patients by reducing cerebral oxygenation".

The first three of ten REFERENCES used by Streeten to support those statements were

1. Da Costa JM. On irritable heart: a clinical study of a form of functional cardiac disorder and its consequences. Am J Med Sci. 1871;61:17-52.

2. Lewis T. The Soldier's Heart and the Effort Syndrome. London, England: Shaw & Sons; 1919.

3. Streeten DHP. Orthostatic Disorders of the Circulation. New York, NY: Plenum; 1987.

That article can be seen in full here http://www.mindfully.org/Health/Chronic-Fatigue-Syndrome-CFS.htm

Here is a quote from the subpage that I provided with a comment on the research of Sir James MacKenzie in 1919, and WhatamIdoing's critical remarks added in red . . . "In 1916[Formatting wrong] Sir James MacKenzie chaired[citation needed] a major[neutrality disputed] medical conference[citation needed] aimed at[citation needed] gaining a better understanding of the condition. He attributed the fatigue to the abnormal pooling of blood in the abdominal and peripheral veins during exertion, which reduced blood flow to the brain". here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:WhatamIdoing/Sandbox&diff=prev&oldid=243268880#1900-1919

In his actual research paper, on page 33, MacKenzie refers to the reduced blood flow to the brain as causing anemia of the brain. and that "It is because of this anemia of the brain that the sense of exhaustion and syncope are provoked", and he adds "I do not enter here into all the facts which support this explanation of the sense of exhaustion, as many observers besides myself have fully dealt with the subject".

Note that in 1998 Streeten was describing the same features that MacKenzie discussed in 1919. In particular that the fatigue was associated with abnormal pooling of blood in the peripheral veins and reduced blood flow to the brain.

The following quote comes from WhatamIdoing on the Requests for Arbitration page at 20:25, 27 January 2009, which was an attempt to convince the arbitrators that I was misrepresenting the reference in J.A.M.A. Note again that I added at least eight more to verify the information, but WhatamIdoing doesn't mention that. Here are WhatamIdoing's exact words . . .

"By "misrepresenting", I mean, for example, that an op-ed piece[30] whose sole mention of DCS is this statement: "It has been speculated that the severe fatigue associated with neurocirculatory asthenia, termed irritable heart syndrome by Da Costa1 and soldier's heart by Lewis2 during World War I, were early descriptions of the symptoms of orthostatic hypotension" has been transmuted in Posturewriter's draft to say, "In 1998 David Streeten presented an article in JAMA[16], explaining that the fatigue reported by Da Costa and Lewis were early descriptions of a "newly recognised" delayed form of orthostatic hypotension which is a feature of some types of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome."" here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration&diff=prev&oldid=266981397#Statement_by_WhatamIdoing

You can see that WhatamIdoing was trying extremely hard to convince the arbitrators that I was using unreliable references about the link between Da Costa's syndrome, Orthostatic hypotension, and a type of chronic fatigue syndrome, however, in fact, I was just responding to the requests to supply some references that linked Da Costa's syndrome to the modern era, and I was not misrepreseting anything, but simply using a modern reference that complied with Wikipedia sourcing policy.

WhatamIdoing was insulting me, and calling my references unreliable, and criticising me relentlessly, and was being hostile, vindictive and eristic, and arguing for the sake of arguing, and being disruptive, and showed no intentions of being co-operative or useful to the development of the page, but just dictated content which is highly selective and biased, and violates Wikipedia policy by deleting verifiable information.

Here are some of the lies and misrepresentation of facts that WhatamIdoing posted on the Administrators Noticeboard on 11-1-09 . . .

"all the editor has done this month is complain that he's not getting his way because I don't agree that a 1951 book or www.anapsid.org are reliable sources for current medical information. His last mainspace edits were in July 2008 (and nearly all of them were reverted as biased, incorrect and/or outdated), so we're not talking about a particularly valuable editor." WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:42, 11 January 2009 see item number 52 here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/IncidentArchive506#Personal_attacks

Note that when my two critics insult me they call it "editing" or "advising", and when I explain the reasons that I used particular references and discussed their reliability they put a deliberately insulting spin on it by calling it "complaining". Note also that they often advertise, or boast about their own value to Wikipedia by making remarks about the 5000 edits that they do each year etc, and have the cheek to say that I am not a "particularly valuable editor". However, intelligent and mature people discuss things on the basis of facts and evidence, and do not lower themselves to personal comments. (For example an experienced sportsman does not go up to a new player and call him stupid, or clumsy just because he doesn't mark the ball every time it is kicked to him - he generally gives words of encouragement about the advantages of practice and perseverance).

Also note that I had previously told WhatamIdoing that the 1951 text book was by Harvard Professor Paul Dudley White who was a world authority on the subject, and that the reference was to a chapter in his book which dealt with a review of the topic which complies with the policy for top quality, and reliable secondary sources in the history sections of topic pages.

When they said that I should not be adding my own theory to the topic I modified it once and then they deleted it again so I stopped adding it, and when they said that my references were old I simply complied with their request to find modern ones.

I had also linked to one page on a medical consumers website, and explained that it was irrelevent to criticise it on the basis of the other pages on that site.

On 27-1-09 WhatamIdoing gave the following misrepresentation of the facts about the reliability of my references on the arbitration page here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration&diff=prev&oldid=266981397#Statement_by_WhatamIdoing

"His complaints about 'moving the goalposts' are an artifact of trying to address specific problems one at a time. So Posturewriter cites his own self-published book (He stopped using the DCS article as a coatrack to publicize his own theory on Wikipedia when an admin promised to block him if he does it again), and other editors explain that Wikipedia relies on properly published materials -- assuming in good faith, that he's trying to find useful information, and that we don't need to spell out every single possible characteristic of a good source over one mistake. So he then cites, say, a case study involving a single patient, to make sweeping statements about the condition. No, we say: major statements like that need to be supported by a secondary source. So he chooses a properly published secondary source -- but from nearly a century ago, and which is known to disagree entirely with current scientific consensus. No, we say: it needs to be a properly published, secondary source that is reasonably current. The goalposts haven't moved during this time: I just didn't post complete explanations of all of the relevant standards in the first message. I also didn't tell him not to shove beans up his nose, and I doubtless excluded other important instructions in my first message . . . WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:25, 27 January 2009"

Note that my critic does not give the arbitrators the specific name of any particular case study, or link it to the precise reference (which is required by Wikipedia sourcing policy) so that the arbitrators can judge for themselves. However, it relates to a long running argument about the website of a patient, and it was compiled in collaboration with four doctors, and was reference number 15, and can be seen here http://www.anapsid.org/cnd/diagnosis/names.html . . . This is what WhatamIdoing wrote about her on the Reliable Sources Noticeboard on 26-1-09 . . . "Her website is clearly self-published under Wikipedia's rules. Kaplan has no medical or veterinary qualifications, and she has not published anything except her website. She is simply a person interested in the subject because it affects her own daily life. She is therefore not a recognized expert in the relevant field.The following four statements are sourced to a webpage titled "The disease of a thousand names" on Kaplan's website: "...(one of the statements is) more than 80 different theories and labels have been proposed and scientifically investigated." WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:17, 26 January 2009 (UTC)

The supposedly sweeping statement was that there had been more than 80 different names given to the chronic fatigue syndrome in the history of the research, and that it included Da Costa's syndrome, which can be seen by scrolling down to the section called "Alternative names for Da Costa's syndrome" in the essay here

Notice that there were an additional seventeen references which have four of five synonyms in the introduction, that I used to support the medical consumers statement about the large number of labels, and to show the general trace of terminology thoughout the history. I added the informaion to Wikipedia several times between January 25th and up to 8:50 on 27-1-09. It was deleted twice each by my two critics, first by Gordonofcartoon, and then by WhatamIdoing, who reverted it at 13:06 on 26-1-09, and 18:12 on 27-1-09 here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Da_Costa%27s_syndrome&diff=266577085&oldid=266514750 . . . and here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Da_Costa%27s_syndrome&diff=266787024&oldid=266755214 and here with these words . . . "Rv POV version by COI-blocked editor using RSN-banned sources such as the personal webpage of a patient"

Fourteen minutes later WhatamIdoing returned to the Reliable Sources noticeboard and made the following statemtent . . . "Posturewriter, this source (Kaplan's) does not meet Wikipedia's standards. All sources must meet the requirements of the basic policy. This one does not. If you can provide a reliable source that includes this information, then the information may be included. But this source itself may not . . . WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:26, 27 January 2009 (UTC)

At that time WhatamIdoing was fully aware of the additional references that had been on my subpage for several months, but deliberately refrained from mentioning them.

This is a quote from the policy pages about the the type of references that are preferred by Wikipedia . . .

The complete list of references that I provided in January 2009 can be seen here.

I have extracted the references which contained four or more lables in their introduction, and presented them below.

I added more than 60 references to verify the information that I provided about Da Costa's syndrome. Only one was by a medical consumer, but WhatamIdoing tried to argue that it was unreliable and that it needed to be removed. However, it was obvious to me that WhatamIdoing was just looking for excuses to waste my time in discussion, but then started telling all of the other editors that it was a reason for deleting it. I therefore decided to give a full explanation to the neutral editors at the reliable sources noticeboard about how I backed it with other references and why I was using it. I also explained that if they still wanted it removed I would delete it, and that it wasn't a significant issue for me because a dozen other references would still show that a large number of labels had been substituted for DCS during it's history, and that was all Mellisa Kaplan was essentially saying as evident from the title of here page "Disease of a thousand names", which contained a list of eighty. However, WhatamIdoing kept referring to it as a website about lizards, and that it was a poor quality source, and that it represented the quality of all of my other refs, and that it should be deleted and I should be blocked for using it. Here is part of the discussions from that time frame where I started deleting the link.

13:06, 27-1-09 . . . The following words were in the first sentence of the Alternative Names section of the DCS page with a link to the medical consumers website which was reference number 15 at 13:06 on 26 January 2009 . . .

"and from a recent website which lists what it claims are more than eighty synonyms.[15]"here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Da_Costa%27s_syndrome&diff=266514750&oldid=266506092#Alternative_names_for_Da_Costa.E2.80.99s_syndrome

8:50, 27-1-09 . . . Note that I started responding to requests from the Reliable Sources editors by removing that phrase at 8:50 on 27 January 2009 here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Da_Costa%27s_syndrome&diff=266713530&oldid=266577085#Alternative_names_for_Da_Costa.E2.80.99s_syndrome

18:12, 27-1-09 . . . Note also that WhatamIdoing would have seen that change but deleted the whole page again anyway nine hours later at 18:12 on 27 January 2009 with these deceitful words of explanation "Rv POV version by COI-blocked editor using RSN-banned sources such as the personal webpage of a patient" here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Da_Costa%27s_syndrome&diff=266787024&oldid=266755214

I then tried to add an explanation to the Reliable Sources Noticeboard to inform the RSN editors that I had already started deleting the link and would continue to remove it if they wished. However, I couldn't post it there because I had been blocked from all content and discussion pages so I added the following new section to my own UserTalk page and then asked other editors to inform the RSN editors of it's location.

At 18:26 on 27-1-09 I added the section "Response to Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard and Kaplan's webpage"

Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard - Sourcing editors from here[133]; Did you notice that I removed the text related to Kaplan's 80 synonyms in the first sentence here[134], to show good faith in you, while you considered the matter further. Also, please note that I could happily remove the other three links to Kaplan because there are another dozen WP:MEDRS refs earlier in the sentence which each have five synonyms in their introduction, and one of them has 10 on it's own, and the combined total probably amounts to more than 20. Could you please also take into account that I was giving support to a medical consumer who made a genuine contribution, but that the article didn't really need it. The 12 references that I use to support one statement in one sentence, exceed the total number that WhatamIdoing has added to the existing page in 12 months. Also, notice that WhatamIdoing is criticising me without reading the diff or noticing that I deleted the main problem text before replacing it to the article page at 18:26 on 27-1-09 here[135]

18:12, 27-1-09 . . . One minute later WhatamIdoing wrote these words on the Da Costa's talk page with these words "I note that Posturewriter declined to remove the unreliable source after being informed that (despite his arguments) every editor at RSN opposed the use of a personal webpage in this article" here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:Da_Costa%27s_syndrome&diff=266789799&oldid=266722358#Da_Costa_Article_page_text_replaced_with_the_text_from_the_Posturewriter.2FDaCostaDraft

(The deceitful nature of WhatamIdoing's words relate to the fact that reliable sources guidelines do not ban medical consumers websites but recommends that some in particular, such as medical journals, are preferred, and that any references may be used if they are appropriate or reliable. Also, the editors on the Reliable Sources Noticeboard were discussing the reference and had not banned it. Note also that I was blocked from adding my explanations to that noticeboard before I had time to give my response to WhatamIdoing's incessant criticism so any discussion after that was "ONE SIDED" BIASED and UNBALANCED, which is typical of WhatamIdoing's ways of manipulating the impressions that other editors get and RIGGING the outcome of discussions).

15:36, 28-1-09 . . . WhatamIdoing then contacted several editors by email and one of them named Moreschi interrupted the arbitration page and banned me at 15:36, 28 January 2009 here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration&diff=prev&oldid=266981397

At 8:24 on 2-2-09 I tried to post the following words on the Reliable Sources Noitceboard for the Sourcing editors to see but found that I was still blocked, so I placed them on my Usertalk page with a request to let the RSN editors know about it. These were the words to the RSN editors . . .

"WhatamIdoing was editing the Da Costa's syndrome page a year ago when it had only four lines of text and no references here[136], and is currently editing this one about Postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome [137], and here is the Da Costa page of 27-1-09 [138], and here is my subpage text which I used to replace the article page on 27-1-09[139] for you to make sourcing quality comparisons. Now that I have explained the matter, would you still like me to remove the other three links to Kaplans page?" Posturewriter (talk) 08:24, 2 February 2009 (UTC)posturewriter

You can see what I did to reach compromises with other editors, or resolve disputes, but WhatamIdoing did not give a dam about discussion or policy and was just being as disruptive as possible, and kept on relentlessly inventing excuses to ignore everything explanation I gave, and delete everything I wrote, and get me blocked.

Another editor supplied a reference to Oglesby Paul's 1987 article on the history of Da Costa's syndrome so I reviewed it. That reference was number 7 on the Da Costa's page at 18:12 on 27-1-09 here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Da_Costa%27s_syndrome&diff=266787024&oldid=266755214#References and it was still there in early June 2009. These words can be seen in the first paragraph . . . "Originally identified in men in wartime, it has been widely recognised as a common chronic condition in both sexes in civilian life".

At 3:38 on 29-5-08 WhatamIdoing supplied reference number 4 to a website??? that includes a "RARE Disease Database" here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Da_Costa%27s_syndrome&diff=next&oldid=215582534

Note that the database includes Da Costa's syndrome in it's list. However the label may be rarely used nowadays but THE RELEVANT FACT is that the condition is still common and the contradiction is OBVIOUS.

My critics also provided links to a book called Soldier's Heart, which I reviewed and found to be a children's fiction novel that did not contain any descriptions of the typical DCS symptoms.

My critics also only supplied about 12 of the current 18 references compared to my 60.

My crtics were trying to focus attention on some supposed faults in a small number of my references, because they didn't want anyone to notice faults in their own, or the fact that I supplied a better quality and quantity and range of references.

"Incidentally, a reliable source - the New York Times review cited from Soldier's Heart (novel), [86] (you'll need a Bugmenot login) - says of the book that Goddard's ... life is shattered by what we now call post-traumatic stress disorder and what was then known as soldier's heart. Gordonofcartoon (talk) 14:10, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

Another example of my critics claiming that I am wrong while their own references support the information that I provide from different and varied sources In December 2007 I added some information about my own theory and research to the DaCosta's syndrome page. The research involved a programme of exercising within limits to improve the general fitness levels of the volunteers. Since then all of the information has been deleted by my two critics and all of my contributions have been described as non-notable, original research, nonsense, and crap. At 18:25 on 30-5-08 Gordonofcartoon wrote this explanation on the Da Costa's talk page . . . "I think it's worth going to more secondary and tertiary souces, since selecting primary sources always raises issues of the fairness of choice. There are a couple of overviews in Oxford Companion to Medicine (reliable, yes?" He followed it with this quote from that book . . . "During the American Civil War J. M. DaCosta described a syndrome in soldiers who had what were apparently cardiac symptoms such as chest pain and palpitation but who in fact had normal hearts. This condition, often called 'irritable heart' or 'soldiers' heart', caused so much invalidism among British soldiers in World War I that a special heart hospital, directed by Thomas Lewis, had to be set up to deal with it. Lewis re-named it the 'effort syndrome' because the symptoms occurred on exertion and he devised a remedial system of physical exercises which enabled over 35 000 men to be returned to active service. . . . Arthur H. Crisp "cardiology - history" The Oxford Companion to Medicine. Stephen Lock, John M. Last, and George Dunea. Oxford University Press 2001". Gordonofcartoon (talk) 18:25, 30 May 2008 here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Da_Costa%27s_syndrome/Archive_1#Names_for_this_phenomenon At 21:21 on 5-10-08 WhatamIdoing cut and pasted the account of Da Costa's syndrome that I prepared on my subpage, and subjected it to 80 nitpicking criticisms such as this one where my text is highlighted in black, and WhatamIdoin's request for a citation is shown in red. . . "Other treatments evident from the previous studies were . . . appropriate levels of exercise where possible,[citation needed][original research?] here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:WhatamIdoing/Sandbox&diff=prev&oldid=243268880#Treatment In the following months I added three citations to support that statement on my subpage text (references numbers 12, 17 and 50, - J.Howell 1985, Harrison's Principles of Internal Medicine 2008, and still the current edition, and R.Whishaw 1939) here  WhatamIdoing deliberately and repeatedly tried to make my theory look ridiculous by oversimplifying it. On 6-10-08 WhatamIdong made these comments to Avnjay about the early drafts of my subpage text . . ."Perhaps more importantly, this draft seriously overemphasizes the body posture aspects (you remember that Posturewriter has self-published a thousand-page book on his personal theory that people with heart palpitations and fatigue would feel better if they exercised and stood up straight, right?) and it ignores or downplays all the DCS-related people that don't agree with him . . . but you can't fix nerves by lifting weights" WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:27, 6 October 2008 here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:WhatamIdoing/Archive_2 On 11-1-09 WhatamIdoing made these ridiculous statements about my references . . . "The editor is an agenda editor (standing up straight cures disease, and now Da Costa's syndrome is a type of Chronic fatigue syndrome because someone that runs an iguana website said so" . . . That quote can be seen in item number 52 of the Administrators Noticeboard here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/IncidentArchive506#Personal_attacks Note that I was not an "agenda editor", and WhatamIdoing ensured that everything that I wrote in Wikipedia was deleted, not just the Da Costa information, so it was not worth my while to waste time on other topics. Also note that WhatamIdoing is being deliberately insulting by saying that, according to my theory, all you have to do to cure disease is stand up straight and lift weights - which is not only a ridiculous oversimplification, but is also the wrong type of exercise. Also note that Harvard Professor Paul Dudley White, who studied this subject for more than fifty years, described Da Costa's syndrome as "a kind of fatigue syndrome . . . and . . . in some cases it is more or less a chronic condition". I also provided about a dozen other top quality references for that statement, and only one from a medical consumers specific webpage about Myalgic Encephalomyelitis and the Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, and not because there was other material on other pages on that website. On 25-1-09 I transferred the text of my subpage to the DCS page and the whole lot was deleted twice by Gordonofcartoon and once by WhatamIdoing as I reverted their deletions, as can be seen here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Da_Costa%27s_syndrome&action=history On 26-1-09 WhatamIdoing has also written a series of ridiculous lies about my sources on the Da Costa's talk page e.g. "Posturewriter has instead relied on his own interpretation of primary sources instead of basing the history section around good secondary sources that directly address the relevant history. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:14, 26 January 2009 etc. here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Da_Costa%27s_syndrome#Da_Costa_Article_page_text_replaced_with_the_text_from_the_Posturewriter.2FDaCostaDraft On 27-1-09 an orderly arbitration process involving 12 editors was suddenly interrupted by Moreschi who banned me. Gordonofcartoon thanked him on his talk page soon after, and has since referred to Moreschi as "the cavalry" (one of his members of an edit war ), and WhatamIdoing provided him with an outlaw halo award for the same reason some months later. Summary: On 30-5-08 Gordonofcartoon used a reference (which he emphasised is a reliable secondary source) to support an earlier argument about synonyms, and it also INADVERTENTLY contained information about the effectiveness of an exercise programme. Eight months later WhatamIdoing, who tries to give the impression of having authoritative knowledge of the subject, played dumb about the benefits of exercise, misrepresented the type of exercise that I recommended (which does not include strenuous activity such as "lifing weights"), and argued against the value of exercise. I then provided three citations to verify the statement, and WhatamIdoing just kept on finding faults and telling ridiculous lies about the reliability of my references until I was banned.

When I wrote a subpage text for Da Costa's syndrome it contained more than 60 reliable references, which included Paul Dudley White's 1951 reference book for cardiologists which was distributed to medical universities throughout the world. In chapter 22 he reviewed all aspects of the research. My two critics described it as a unreliable source of information because, in their "opinion", it was just an ordinary book that was "old" and "published before most editors were born".

However, when they deleted my subpage text they replaced it with a much smaller article which they supported by only 18 references, and one of theirs was written by the same author, Paul Dudley White and his regular collaborator, Mandel E.Cohen and was published in the same year.

Here are the details . . .

My reference (which I cited 35 times to verify 35 statements in my text ) Number 4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z aa ab ac ad ae af ag ah White, Paul Dudley (1951). Heart Disease. New York, New York: MacMillan. pp. 578-591. see here 8:50 on 27-1-09 here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Da_Costa%27s_syndrome&diff=266713530&oldid=266577085#References

Their reference (which they cited only once to verify only one of the statements in their text) Cohen ME, White PD (1951). "Life situations, emotions, and neurocirculatory asthenia (anxiety neurosis, neurasthenia, effort syndrome)". Psychosom Med 13 (6): 335­57. PMID 14892184. See 18:12 on 27-1-09 here http://www.psychosomaticmedicine.org/cgi/pmidlookup?view=long&pmid=14892184

Essentially what they were doing was going through my 60 references and saying "we" like this one so "we" will keep it, but "we" don't like those ten so "we" will delete them etc, until they had an article that supported "their" point of view, and then they accused "me" of cherrypicking information to push my point of view????

By contrast, when they "occasionally" provided different references I added them to my list of 60 to include "all" points of view, even though I didn't agree with theirs, and I did it because it was an article for Wikipedia which had policies that required "Neural point of view". re: when in Rome do as the Romans do!

An editor started a discussion on the Reliable Sources Noticeboard with the heading "Sources appropriate for medical and health-related articles", and then another editor started a sub-section to discuss the reliability of one particular author named Khiefet, and at 17:14 on 18-8-09 WhatamIdoing gave a personal opinion.

I have used an extract below to show the words of the editor who created the section, followed by WhatamIdoing's reply

At 16:38 on 18-8-09 Garrondo wrote . . . "I have created an specific subsection for the question on weather the author can or cannot be considered an expert to ease commentaries. I have asked for specific input in the medicine project".--[[User:Garrondo]] 16:38, 18 August 2009

At 17:14 on 18-8-09 WhatamIdoing gave this reply with an edit note . . . "Usability of Keiffets review: Obviously an expert" . . . and these words . . .
'''Definitely an expert'''. She was the head of the radiation program for the [[World Health Organization]], and she's now a professor of epidemiology at UCLA, and there's still some question about whether she's an expert on the epidemiology of radiation? She was on the radiation standards safety committee for the [[IAEA]]], and we're asking whether she might know a thing or two about the harmful effects of radiation? She's been on the International Committee on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection (ICNIRP)'s Standing Committee on Epidemiology since 2001, and we're wondering if she might know something about the epidemiology of non-ionizing radiation? She's published dozens of papers, including papers about this specific risk factor in several different diseases. <br />''Of course she's an expert on the epidemiology of radiation.'' Khiefets is ''exactly'' the kind of person that Wikipedia should be using as a source. I can't even imagine a more appropriate source. (Having said that, her status as an expert still doesn't authorize editors to exceed the usual conservative, "obvious to the non-expert" reading of her paper.) WhatamIdoing|talk]])" 17:14, 18 August 2009 here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard&diff=prev&oldid=308716845

Note that WhatamIdoing is determining the reliability of the information by referring to Khiefets personal background and experience with regard to the number of committees she has been on or headed, the number of articles she has published, and the number of years that she has been involved - since 2001 - 8 years.

WhatamIdoing has been highly critical of my sources of information so I would like to help the other editors on the Reliable Sources Noticeboard by solving WhatamIdoing's mystery about who is a more appropriate source of reliable information for medical topics.

The topic in this example is the history of Da Costa's syndrome. Here are some much more reliable sources of medical information that I used . . .

Firstly, J.M. DaCosta, whose 1871 paper was responsible for 150 years of research that followed, secondly Sir James MacKenzie, Sir William Osler, and Sir Thomas Lewis, who were knighted for their contributions to medicine, and who all had a major influence on the early study of Da Costa's syndrome. MacKenzie was described as one of the giants of the British school of cardiology who played a pivotal role in this research, and Lewis gave it the lable of "Effort Syndrome" which became one of the most commonly used diagnoses. Another source was Paul Wood O.B.E. who studied and lectured on this subject, and became the Director of the Institute of Cardiology at the National Hosptial for Diseases of the Heart, London, and Paul Dudley White who studied the subject for fifty years and was also an emeritus professor of Harvard, and a founder and a president of the American Heart Association, and Harvard professor Oglesby Paul, who was also a president of the American Heart Association, and who published a biography of Paul Dudley White. I also provided references to the journal articles and books of Charles Wooley from 1976, 1990, 2002, and 2004. They are just seven authors from a list of sixty references that I provided.

According to WhatamIdoing Sir James MacsKenzie was just an ordinary doctor who walked in off the street and attended an ordinary meeting, Paul Dudley White's 1951 book was old and out-of-date, and Oglesby Paul was just some guy who wrote a routine review about Da Costa's syndrome, and all of those authors were unimportant in the history of the topic, and all of my references were unreliable.

Note that WhatamIdoing was misrepresenting the facts about those authors in order to discredit them, but I am not going to do the same to Khiefet. I am merely providing evidence that WhatamIdoing's assessment of the reliability of sources is full of bias and extreme contradictions.

See more information about MacKenzie here and the list of more than 60 References that I provided here

From the early time in the dispute my critics revealed their pompous "know all" attitude when they described Da Costa's syndrome as "garden variety" orthostatic intolerance and hyperventilation syndrome. When they discussed Rosen's research paper on hyperventilation syndrome one of them said that it was the same as the effort syndrome and the other said it wasn't. When I added a brief review of Oglesby Pail's history of DCS they replaced it with one sentence about anxiety. When I included information about the history of DCS from references published between 1863 to 1980 my critics deleted most of them on the grounds that they were "out-of-date", so I checked the policy related to the history sections of medical articles, and other medical topics, and found that older references were acceptable, and in common use. When they moved a link for a novel called Soldier's Heart to the top of the DCS page I asked them to give me page numbers from that book where the symptoms of DCS were mentioned and they changed the subject and didn't answer the question. When I told them that it was inappropriate to give that label undue prominence by placing it at the top of the page they argued that it belonged their because of hatnote policy. After I was banned two different editors deleted the hatnote, and the link to the label. During an RFC process one of my critics encouraged other editors to act as if they had authority which they didn't actually have. Finally, while they were criticising my contributions they claimed to be giving objective, rule-abiding advice, but after I was banned one of them lost their temper on the POV/CIVIL pushing page and expressed relief by using foul language. Four months later the other one thanked an editor for breaking the rules of Wikipedia to get me banned, and saving them from tearing their hair out.

When I first saw the Da Costa's page in Wikipedia it had no references - NONE, so I started adding some until the total exceeded sixty, and my critics were falsely and incessantly referring to them as unreliable according to their deliberate misinterpretation of MEDRS policy. They spent most of their time focussing attention on a medical consumers site which I added for NPOV, and Paul White's, who studied the subject for 50 years, and they said his evidence (whch I put in the history section) were an unreliable source - of modern opinion????

Another one io the sixty references that I added was J.M.DaCosta's original 1871 research paper which is ESSENTIAL to understanding the subject. (my critics didn't put it there before me because their idea about reliable references for history sections are the paragraphs they get from dictionaries and websites, and the history articles that have been written in their favorite modern journals)

The following words come from J.M.Da Costa's first paragraph, which were THE FIRST WORDS EVER WRITTEN ON THE TOPIC.

"In this paper I propose to consider a form of cardiac malady COMMON among soldiers . . . Much of what I am about to say I could duplicate from the experience of PRIVATE PRACTICE."

One of the small number of references that was provided by my critics was by Oglesby Paul in 1987, which I was familiar with, so I reviewed it for Wikipedia. The following words come from the first paragraph.

"The syndrome variously called Da Costa's syndrome . . . has been studied for more than 100 years by many distinguished physicians. Originally identified in men in wartime, it has been WIDELY RECOGNISED as a COMMON chronic condition in both sexes in CIVILIAN life"

Oglesby also wrote on page 311 . . . "Cohen and White reported that 2-4% of the population had this disorder".

Note also that Oglesby Paul, Cohen, and White, were prominent U.S. researchers, and that 2-4% of the U.S. population of 200 million would be four to eight million.

One of the references used by my critics was the RARE DISEASES DATA BASE on an internet webpage : see reference number 4 here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Da_Costa%27s_syndrome&diff=266787024&oldid=266755214#References

This is Wikipedia's definition from it's "Rare Disease" topic page . . . "A rare disease . . . is any disease that is not common. Typically, a rare disease has such a low prevalence in a population that a physician in a busy general practice would not expect to see more than one case a year" . . . and . . . "In the United States of America, the Rare Disease Act of 2002 defines rare disease strictly according to prevalence, as "any disease or condition that affects less than 200,000 persons in the United States,"[2] or about 1 in 1,500 people. here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Rare_disease&diff=299958933&oldid=299949371

Note that my two critics did not give a reference to verify the first sentence on the Da Costa's page, or even the entire first section, and they used reference number nine (relating to Selhein Neuhof) to support the statement in the "Symptoms" section. They have falsely accused me of only using references that were "old", but in their own case, Neuhof's article was first published in 1917. Some of the information that he provided about exercise was contradictory, and other statements were made while failing to distinguish several different conditions, and are ACTUALLY WRONG. Neuhof also stated that there was no evidence of cardiovascular disease, which is a lot different to saying that there is no physical abnormalities at all. He also states that there is no flouroscopic evidence of abnormalities in the heart, but it has since been established that there is flouroscopic evidence of faulty function of the thoracic diaphram. He also states that "reassurance about the heart is the mainstay of treatment". Needless to say that if a person has chest pain, he is unlikely to believe a doctor who advises him that there is nothing wrong with his heart - just because a doctor says so, unless he has a credible explanation, such as telling him that it is due to strain on the muscles between the ribs. e.g. see here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Da_Costa%27s_syndrome&diff=266787024&oldid=266755214#Symptoms

Note also that my critics try to justify the reliability of their references by emphasising that they use medical dictionaries. Dictionaries contain up to 2000 pages of definitions that are mostly only one sentence, or one paragraph for each, and they change from one edition to the next, and are different from the definitions found in other medical dictionaries for copyright reasons, and can, and often do contain misleading wording. My clitics also used the World Health Organsiation as an example of reliability, however they are only one of many official organisations and need to be taken in that context.

They also don't seem to understand that the words as defined by physicians do not mean the same as they are understood by patients. For example when a doctor says there is nothing organically, or physically wrong with them, the patient thinks that there is no way of explaining their symptoms, when in fact there are dozens of physical signs, and a lot of physical evidence to explain them.

My two critics also don't seem to understand the fundamental principle of Wikipedia of gaining information from all sources, not just medical journals. The authors of such journals have their own views and are often influenced by the organisations that fund the research, which is why some journals, for ethical reasons, require their contributors to declare the source of their funds.

Wikipedia is supposed to overcome all of those problems by deriving all knowledge from all sources, but when you look at the policies you can see where that neutrality is diminished. A good example is where I provided a link to a medical consumer's webpage that was compiled in collaboration with four doctors, to give some NPOV input, and my critics not only criticised it for being unreliable according to MEDRS policy, but also tried to discredit that person by making irrelevant comments about other sections of their website, and by repeatedly implying that all medical consumers were an unreliable source, regardless of the merit and independent verifiability of their information e.g. At 23:04, 11 January 2009 here here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Disruptive_editing#WhatamIdoing.E2.80.99s_Blitz_Krieg_-_Disruptive_Editing.3F.

Note also that it was only one of my 65 references, but my critics were trying to imply that because it was from a consumer, all the others were unreliable, which is ridiculous

Wikipedia:Reliable sources (medicine-related articles) . . . Use up-to-date evidence:

The exact words from the policy relating to medical articles are . . . "Here are some rules of thumb for keeping an article up-to-date while maintaining the more-important goal of reliability . . . Look for reviews published in the last five years or so, preferably in the last two or three years. The range of reviews examined should be wide enough to catch at least one full review cycle, containing newer reviews written and published in the light of older ones and of more-recent primary studies.
These are just rules of thumb. There are exceptions:. . . History sections often cite older work, for obvious reasons" here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Reliable_sources_(medicine-related_articles)&diff=301215071&oldid=301210167#Use_up-to-date_evidence

5-10-08 WhatamIdoing wrote this deliberate misinterpretation of sourcing policy to an editor name Avnjay . . . Avnjay, I realize that you're not competent in the subject matter . . . he (Posturewriter) lists the same thoroughly outdated (1951!) textbook eighteen separate times The most recent source is eleven years old (see WP:MEDRS#Use_up-to-date_evidence -- and it is about Chronic fatigue syndrome, not Da Costa's.
Would you like a detailed response? WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:15, 5 October 2008

(Note that Paul Dudley White was the most prominent expert in the history of the subject. and that he was the author of the 1951 text book. Also note that WhatamIdoing was supposed to be co-operating by providing modern references if required, but did nothing but criticise and disrupt the process, so I had to do it myself and the final list of references totalled 65, and more than a dozen were from the period 1998 to 2009).

5-10-09 WhatamIdoing wrote these deliberately misleading words on a Sandbox page . . . "This article explains, in excessive detail, the opinions of carefully selected researchers from half a century ago. It should not be mistaken for the modern medical understanding of this condition". here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:WhatamIdoing/Sandbox&diff=prev&oldid=243268880#Da_Costa.E2.80.99s_Syndrome

Note that the early history of the article was never meant to explain the modern view, and that I did explain the modern ideas later in the same article - and WhatamIdoing knew that.

6-10-08 The independent and neutral editor named Avnjay wrote these honest and accurate words of advice to WhatamIdoing's talk page . . . A large part of his (Posturewriters) article is on the history of the syndrome hence all the old sources (an exception in [[WP:MEDRS#Use_up-to-date_evidence]]). [[User:Avnjay| 15:26, 6 October 2008 here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:WhatamIdoing&diff=243447512&oldid=243362701

11-1-09 WhatamIdoing wrote these deliberately misleading words on the Disruptive Editing page . . . "Posturewriter, the place to convince people that a 1951 book conforms with WP:MEDRS#Use_up-to-date_evidence for current medical and scientific information . . . is at WP:RSN, not here" WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:04, 11 January 2009 here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia_talk:Disruptive_editing&diff=299452881&oldid=296934378#WhatamIdoing.E2.80.99s_Blitz_Krieg_-_Disruptive_Editing.3F

12-1-09 I then posted this reply the following day . . . "WhatamIdoing; Avnjay is already aware that Paul Dudley White's book is relevant here[17], so I don't have to convince him of anything. This page is about disruptive editing" Posturewriter (talk) 07:01, 12 January 2009 (UTC)posturewriter

27-1-09 WhatamIdoing continued to misrepresent the book, and the way I used it in the history section with these words . . . "seriously outdated materials (a 1951 textbook is cited thirty-four times in his preferred draft WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:25, 27 January 2009 here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration&diff=prev&oldid=266981397#Statement_by_WhatamIdoing

Note 1. WhatmaIdoing is being ridiculous by referring to the subpage as my preferred draft, because the whole purpose was to get everyone involved, including WhatamIdoing who was invited to do a draft as well, so that neutral editors could then merge them to represent "neutral point of view" instead of having the page continue as WhatamIdoing's personal dictatorship. However, WhatamIdoing was deliberately refusing to co-operate with that process by deliberately not doing a draft, and then deliberately disrupting mine, and deliberately interfering with the neutral editing process. That deliberate and calculated interference included referring to the neutral editor as "incompetent", and then spending months making derisive and insulting remarks about me, and then relentlessly nitpicking every word I wrote to persuade him to stop co-operating with me. see here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:WhatamIdoing/Archive_2#Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment.2FPosturewriter

Note 2. Avnjay was the neutral editor who started in Wikipedia in July 2007 (see here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Avnjay) and had almost a full year of experience editing and policy before making comments as an outsider on the Request for comments page on 21-7-08 about the Da Costa's discussion. He participated in discussions on that page for a month until 30-8-09 and later started co-operating with me on the sub-page text on 2-10-09, and described my text as being much better than the existing page there, and again on WhatamIdoing's own talk page on 5-10-08 here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:WhatamIdoing/Archive_2#Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment.2FPosturewriter

Note that WhatamIdoing did not make any comments about Avnjay's competence until a few hours after he described my article with these words . . . "To be honest, in my opinion, it's actually a lot better" than the existing version.

It is perfectly clear that WhatamIdoing was reacting out of spite, and that if it wasn't for the incessant petty criticism that followed, the article described by an independent and neutral editor as "a lot better" would have been used as a replacement for the existing text. At that stage sensible unbiased editors could have added to it or modified it in an appropriate manner. They could have discussed, abbreviated, or improved various sections of the history, and the relation to modern views, without needing to vandalise the page with the massive slab deletion of important, relevant, and independently verifiable facts..

Note 3. WhatamIdoing has a record of more than 18000 edits in more than 4 years, and acts with the tone and manner of a dictator when discussing medical topics and medical referencing policy, however, when I mentioned that WhatamIdoing was not a health care professional Gordonofcartoon gave this pompous and sanctimonious defense . . .

"not a healthcare professional . . . Did I say anything about being a healthcare professional? I said "medical editor" - one who routinely edits on medical topics here, and hence is thoroughly conversant with aspects such as WP:MEDRS. Gordonofcartoon (talk) 10:25, 27 January 2009" on the Da Costa's talk page here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:Da_Costa%27s_syndrome&diff=266789799&oldid=266722358#Da_Costa_Article_page_text_replaced_with_the_text_from_the_Posturewriter.2FDaCostaDraft

It is obvious to me that WhatamIdoing was fully conversant with Wikipedia medical referencing policy, so Gordonofcartoon was being insolent and offensive by trying to create the ridiculous false impression that I didn't know that. It is equally obvious that WhatamIdoing had been deliberately deceitful in interpreting policy. For example this is the version of policy about medical references which I was told that I must comply with and it states . . . "Use up-to-date evidence . . . Here are some rules of thumb for keeping an article up-to-date while maintaining the more-important goal of reliability . . . Look for reviews published in the last five years or so, preferably in the last two or three years".

However, this is the actual section of policy that is relevant and that WhatamIdoing DELIBERATELY FAILED TO MENTION, and that I found by reading the full policy myself . . . "These are just rules of thumb. There are exceptions . . . History sections often cite older work, for obvious reasons. see here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:MEDRS#Use_up-to-date_evidence

When I mentioned the correct, relevant interpretation of policy WhatamIdoing DELIBERATELY ignored me and went to more pages to repeat the same lies to other editors who hadn't seen my explanation. In fact WhatamIdoing told so many lies at such a rapid rate, that I couldn't get to respond to them before discussions were closed, or I was banned, and I can still find evidence of more lies six months later.

When I first saw a page about Da Costa's Syndrome in Wikipedia, it had an invitation for members of the public to improve it, and soon after I started, another editor set up a section called History. Some time later I added the reference to J.M.Da Costa's original research paper of 1871 because it had not been provided by anyone else.

I also provided the article with 60 references to describe the history from 1864 to 2008. My two critics deleted most of them on the grounds that they were "old", "seriously outdated", "entirely superseded", or "from nearly a century ago" or, "from before most editors were born" . They kept the description from 1863 to 1876 and deleted everyting from 1876 to 2008 (132 years of research) here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Da_Costa%27s_syndrome&diff=266787024&oldid=266755214#History

In December 1997 I saw a page about Da Costa's Syndrome in Wikipedia with a general invitation for members of the public to add information to it. That page contained only four lines of text with no references here. I began contributing and several editors made corrections and layout improvements which enhanced it considerably, but then I added some information about my own research findings. Ever since then several editors, but two in particular, have changed their attitude from being friendly, co-operative, and useful, to being hostile, insulting, derogatory, offensive, and disruptive, and within a short time they had used trumped up policy reasons to delete everything about my own research, as well as deleting it again after I responded to their request to abbreviate it, and then they proceeded to delete everything else I wrote. For example, when I added several paragraphs describing a Harvard scholars history of at least a dozen controversial theories on the topic, they deleted them and replaced them with one sentence favoring their own opinion here. They also went to several other topic pages where I had added one or two sentences, and used trumped up policy reasons for deleting them here etc. They continued in that manner, and over a period of ten months tried to bamboozle me with what they thought would be an obstacle course of jargon, and when I questioned them about some of their mistakes, e.g. here, and here, and here, they cited multiple policy reasons for deleting my contributions, and then they went to many discussion or forum pages to seek the assistance of up to fifty other editors to block me. In essence they were deleting all significant scientific evidence of a physical cause, and replacing it with references to psychosomatic concepts, and then they added a link to the end of the page which opened a window where Da Costa's syndrome was highlighted in bold print in the middle of a list of more that 80 mental illnesses.

My contributions would amount to perhaps eight to ten A4 pages in Wikipedia (and many medical pages are that length), but the combined criticism would probably surpass one hundred A4 pages of text if copied and printed.

Eventually another two editors saw the disputes and suggested that I and my critics set up separate subpages to present our contributions without interference, which were then to be merged by "neutral point of view" editors (NPOV's) later, and one of them provided me with a sub-page. I advised them that I would add the contents a few weeks later on a Sunday. I also predicted that my critics would find a way of stopping that from happening because, if my text was added to Wikipedia their article would not look credible. Within two weeks another editor closed the Requests for Comments page with advice that I would be banned from contributing to the Da Costa's syndrome article page if I added any more information to it. I had been progressively blocked from adding anything to the Da Costa page, and then the discussion page, and then to any pages related to Da Costa, and then to any medical pages. e.g. with these words on 27-1-09 . . . "I think that a broad topic ban (including Da Costa's syndrome, Chronic fatigue syndrome, Varicose veins, and any articles even slightly related to human posture, fitness, or fatigue) is an appropriate outcome. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:25, 27 January 2009" here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration&diff=prev&oldid=266981397#Statement_by_WhatamIdoing

I was, of course, in the process of preparing the article and have since completed it ready to be used as a replacement for the existing Da Costa's syndrome page, but rather than argue with editors for another twelve months I have decided to present the information on my own website here. My critics had been arguing that wiki policy on medical articles required that I should only use references that were consistent with medical dictionary definitions or medical textbook descriptions that had been published within the past two years, and that anything other than that was unreliable, and anything older than that was obsolete. Their method of using policies and forums to control the content in Wikipedia would prevent their readers from gaining a proper understanding of the subject and would be of interest to "media studies" students, so I will add the full text of those discussions on another page in due course for those who wish to consider it.

THE LAST FEW COMMENTS ON MY WIKIPEDIA USER TALK PAGE

A response to SmokeyJoe's question about COI and my publications etc??? here

SmokeyJoe; Regarding my publications; I became interested in medical research in 1975 and wrote a series of about 16 essays for the Australasian Nurses Journal, ending with a three page theory about posture in 1980. After showing it to a friend of mine, who was also a friend of the head of the South Australian Institute For Fitness Research and Training, I was invited to design and co-ordinate a study of patients who were having chronic problems with fatigue. I was involved in the fatigue study for 1 year plus pre and post designing and summing up time. During that time six people, including a cardiologist, were on the organising committee, and a newspaper journalist, who had assisted in recruiting volunteers on several occasions, attended one of the meetings. The other programmes on fitness and heart disease, asthma and arthritis etc. were designed by research cardiologists. Twelve years later (1n 1992), I had a blood test which gave evidence of some abnormalities, and that was followed by a series of other tests and a CAT scan which all showed evidence of cancer (Non-Hodgkin's Lymphoma). A haematologist gave me his opinion that I had a three months life expectancy with no hope of a cure. He then advised me to tidy up my financial affairs which is a standard medical euphemism for "write your will" (He was clear and open about the prognosis because I asked him to be frank with me). I thanked him for his advice. During the following week I considered that I would not live long enough to study and devise my own cure for cancer. I also abandoned all of my other plans and decided to write a book on posture and health, and keep adding to it until the inevitable. I sold it by phone calls to librarians. The book increased in size at the rate of 150 pages a year for 8 years, and I charged $60 each for the last edition to cover the cost of printing, binding, and postage. During that time I had two periods of surgery and chemotherapy, and a stem cell transplant in the year 2000. The cancer has been in remission ever since. I stopped writing the posture book and started on "The Health Biographies of Alexander Leeper, Robert Louis Stevenson, and Fanny Stevenson, concluding that Louis had chronic tuberculosis attributable to the Industrial pollution of Nineteenth Century Edinburgh which polluted his lungs and made them vulnerable to infection, and that the contagious ailments of his family were due to the plagues of Malaria and Typhoid in the pre-antibiotic era, and that he died of a stroke in his early forty's because he was a chain smoker and a binge drinker. The other biography was about Alexander Leeper. His education included studies at Oxford University and he was regarded as one of Victoria's great men. He was also a prominent educator who promoted the ideas of Frederick Matthias Alexander which he recommended for use in the development of good posture in all school children as a means of preventing disease in adulthood. The book of three biographies included about 200 pages, and the cover photo of the Stevensons' home was provided by the curator of the Robert Louis Stevenson museum in Samoa, where Louis spent his last few years of life.

The side effects of my own cancer treatment gradually subsided between 2000 and 2004, during which time I became involved in other activities that were not related to medicinePosturewriter (talk) 07:56, 8 February 2009 (UTC)posturewriter

SmokeyJoe; Can you please leave a message on Wizardman's talk page notifying him of my question about why the RFC page was closed while still active, and could you ask Moreschi to explain why the arbitration was decided without me having the opportunity to present my side of the diffs. ThankyouPosturewriter (talk) 07:56, 8 February 2009 (UTC)posturewriter

Response to Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard and Kaplan's webpage

Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard - Sourcing editors from here[133]; Did you notice that I removed the text related to Kaplan's 80 synonyms in the first sentence here[134], to show good faith in you, while you considered the matter further. Also, please note that I could happily remove the other three links to Kaplan because there are another dozen WP:MEDRS refs earlier in the sentence which each have five synonyms in their introduction, and one of them has 10 on it's own, and the combined total probably amounts to more than 20. Could you please also take into account that I was giving support to a medical consumer who made a genuine contribution, but that the article didn't really need it. The 12 references that I use to support one statement in one sentence, exceed the total number that WhatamIdoing has added to the existing page in 12 months. Also, notice that WhatamIdoing is criticising me without reading the diff or noticing that I deleted the main problem text before replacing it to the article page at 18:26 on 27-1-09 here[135]

WhatamIdoing was edting the Da Costa's syndrome page a year ago when it had only four lines of text and no references here[136], and is currently editing this one about Postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome [137], and here is the Da Costa page of 27-1-09 [138], and here is my subpage text which I used to replace the article page on 27-1-09[139] for you to make sourcing quality comparisons. Now that I have explained the matter, would you still like me to remove the other three links to Kaplans page? Posturewriter (talk) 08:24, 2 February 2009 (UTC)posturewriter

Your talk page

You have been indefinitely blocked. Continuing to use your talk page as a forum whilst blocked is inappropriate - either request an unblock using the {{unblock}} template, or stop editing. If you continue to soapbox on this page your ability to edit it will be removed. GbT/c 10:21, 2 February 2009 (UTC)
Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Posturewriter"

When you read their words below, which I have cut and pasted from the Wikipedia POV discussion page, please note that I have repeatedly criticised them for their double standards in the past, insofar as they expect other people to comply with Wikipedia policies, but they don't comply themselves e.g. here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Requests_for_comment/Posturewriter#My_Solution_to_the_Double_Standard_Editing_.28DSE.29__on_Sources and here - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Requests_for_comment/Posturewriter#More_evidence_of_double_standard_editing .

THE POV ACCUSATION; As you will soon see, the double standards blatantly apply to the NPOV policy. However, please first consider the discussion starting on the 15-5-08 here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Da_Costa%27s_syndrome/Archive_1#Physical_v_psychosomatic . . .

Note that WhatamIdoing, the self-described "instant expert" with the self-professed "annoyingly high IQ", has agreed with me that the symptoms are due to a "physical" problem, but then demonstrates a personal POV by cherrypicking one of Jenny King's research papers and agreeing with, and therefore favoring it over all others. WhatamIdoing adds that "HVS explains all of the symptoms" . . . but does not mention that many other theories "explain all of the symptoms", and that not everyone agrees with WhatamIdoing and Jenny Kings POV.

WhatamIdoing then goes on to to express the opinion that DCS is a "sloppy diagnosis", but that is very offensive way of describing the first detailed description of the condition which distinguished the symptoms from heart disease. WhatamIdoing then adds that the label has gone out of fashion because there is now a better understanding of the disorder with more precise diagnoses, but does not say what the "precise" diagnoses were. However, there is just as much confusion about the cause of the DCS symptoms nowadays as there has ever been. Furthermore, according to WhatamIdoing here and elsewhere, the modern diagnoses are mixed in with "imprecise" and "poorly characterised" post-war and post-traumatic stress disorders, and several unspecified anxiety disorders??? and is "generally considered" to be psychosomatic - and the words "generally considered to be" mean - not everyone is convinced of it.

WhatamIdoing also repeatedly makes contradictory comments about what Da Costa's syndrome is called nowadays, such as it is just "garden variety orthostatic intolerance and hyperventilation syndrome" here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Da_Costa%27s_syndrome/Archive_1#Banfield . . . and it is described as the same as several other conditions elsewhere.

WhatamIdoing then pushes the POV that the symptoms are due to "anxiety-related hyperventilation" without mentioning that there are other theories about the cause of HVS, or that there have been doubts about whether the physical aspect is cause or effect. Therefore WhatamIdoing has been giving undue weight to the anxiety cause, by excluding others, which is a violation of "WP:undue weight" guidelines here - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Undue_weight#Undue_weight.

WhatamIdoing "the instant expert" then expresses another POV that "the cardiac symptoms look strikingly like Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome". Note that they would look "strikingly" similar to an "instant expert" who had just started to study the subject and "suddenly" noticed the similarity. It would also be classified as WhatamIdoing's personal 'opinion' which is also 'Original Research' which is a violation of OR policy. In other words it is an example of WhatamIdoing violating NOR (No Original Research) and NPOV.

WhatamIdoing's choice of sources and content are the "only" ones that get to stay in Wikipedia. However, I have been summarising "all" research, all labels, all theories, and all opinions to provide APOV - All Points Of View, and therefore a neutral point of view - NPOV, yet WhatamIdoing has accused me of pushing my own POV???? and violating NPOV????

My theory and research were deleted 12 months ago and I have since been writing the research history of Da Costa's syndrome, not just the nineteenth century history, not just the recent history, not just the psychiatric history, not just cardiology history, not just the HVS history, not just the military history, not just the civilian history, not just Paul Dudley White's history, and not just Oglesby Paul's history etc. but was providing a balanced summary of all of it.

My first critics remarks; Their ID code is WhatamIdoing:

I have highlighted their choice of deliberately offensive and derogatory words in red print . . .

This is, in the grand scheme of things, a minor case, but it may illustrate some of the damage:

We have identified a single-purpose account, run by an identifiable individual who "just happens" to have a non-mainstream take on a particular set of symptoms. His real article, called The posture theory, was deleted as non-notable through AfD. A few days later, he decided to hang his idea on the peg of "Da Costa's syndrome" (a vague 19th century syndrome, generally considered a psychosomatic anxiety disorder). It's overall an unimportant article for Wikipedia, so we can't justify investing several editors' time and energy into turning it into a little gem of an article and discrediting his personal views. Considering the basic priorities, the goal for this article is to have it not actually be actively wrong while we deal with more important articles, like Meningitis or Mental health.

The SPA editor is no more frustrated with the NPOV-oriented editors than we are with him. He's (finally) mostly given up on getting his name and his website (with his expensive self-published book for sale) in the article. He comes by every week or two and adds bona fide medical publications on the subject -- but always and only those articles which support his particular views. Of course, the condition is entirely superseded, so most of the refs are from before most editors were born.

No editor has ever supported his view. Five editors have directly told him that using Wikipedia to promote his personal ideas is not accepted. We've been at this for more than six months, and he's undeterred in his overall goal.

But what sort of support do we get from the broader community? We get responses that add up to "Y'all play nice, now." "It's a content dispute: you should 'work for a consensus'." "You could just keep removing the stuff he adds; it's not like your time and energy is worth anything." "Surely nobody would deliberately add original research, because adding original research (*gasp*) violates Wikipedia's policy."

Yes, of course all of this violates a variety of policies, guidelines, and cultural conventions -- notably WP:CONSENSUS, WP:NOR, WP:NPOV, WP:COI, WP:RS, WP:TRUTH and WP:COPYVIO, in this case. But my existing attitude readjustment tools apparently don't reach as far as Australia, and the editor remains unscathed.

It's back at WP:COI/N for a second go-round. I expect no practical improvement: he's not particularly rude, so why bother blocking him? Unless I'm willing to undertake a concerted campaign to drive away the editor by convincing him that Wikipedia is controlled by a particularly rude version of the Wicked Witch of the West, then I'll probably still be removing the same cruft and leaving the same explanations and warnings on talk pages at the end of the year.

And that, BTW, is the only effective solution currently in place: When I am no longer willing to put up with this self-promoting nonsense, I can team up with other disgusted editors to be so mean and rude to the SPA that he leaves in disgust. It's not just the good editors who can be driven away by bad behavior. Unfortunately, every time someone resorts to that approach, Wikipedia's reputation is damaged.

We need another solution. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:25, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

1. When my critic refers to this as a "minor case" in the "grand scheme of things", they are trying to understate their major attempt to discredit me for the past 12 months, and it took that long because they kept on losing most of the arguments.

2. When they refer to me as a "single-purpose account" they are trying to create the false impression that I only have only one topic of interest. However I have many interests and my 1000 page book refers to dozens of ailments. They don't just want to stop me from contributing to the Da Costa's topic page, but to all medical pages, and they have just banned me permanently.

They are also saying that people, such as myself, who have had a lot of knowledge and experience with a subject, are not good sources of information for Wikipedia, while my critics should be able to dictate what information gets into Wikipedia on the basis of their newly acquired "instant expertise"??? as mentioned here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:WhatamIdoing&diff=247115577&oldid=247067496

They also expect new contributors, such as myself, to write about subjects that they have no knowledge of, and are not interested in, presumably because that it the only way that my critics - the "instant experts" or "Jacks of all trades" are ever going to win content arguments.

When they say that I added a couple of references to the Wikipedia page each week they are not telling you that it is the way I do most essays, and that it also provided my two critics with the opportunity to add information which they thought was relevant during the week, but 95% of the time they chose to do nothing except criticise me. (The reason that they didn't want to mix their information with my "scientific references", was because the evidence sheds doubt on their account of the condition).

When they say that my book was expensive they are not telling you that the sales price was established to pay for the cost of printing, binding, and postage, with no profit being made.

When they say that The Posture Theory was deleted as being non-notable on AFD they are not giving a link to the discussion. Here it is http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/The_posture_theory&diff=prev&oldid=174977810

Note that I answered all of the editors questions fully and courteously, and then they said "We just need dates, titles (and most preferably links to online versions of all of this) so it can actually be verified that everything you said is true". Note that they wanted proof online but such information was not available for articles written in newspapers 30 years ago, so I provided them with the name of a journalist and the phone number of the newspaper and they deleted the article anyway. They did not say that the decision was that the article was not notable because, after me providing that information they would have looked ridiculous. They finished the discussion with the words "Close discussion:Delete" and did not specify a reason. Also when I later provided online proof by putting a scanned copy of one of the newspaper articles on my website they should have said "ONLINE PROOF PROVIDED AS REQUESTED - THANKYOU - ARTICLE ACCEPTED", however they changed their attitude and have since repeatedly argued that it was proof of conflict of interest, and self-identification, and self-promotion etc. - their hippocracy is blatant, offensive, and ridiculous e.g. here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Conflict_of_interest/Noticeboard/Archive_23.

3. When they say that no editor has ever supported my views they are not telling you that before my name was mentioned on the Da Costa's page, many editors were enthusiastically co-operating with me, and since then an editor named SmokeyJoe has said that my references are not insignificant here - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Miscellany_for_deletion/User_talk:Posturewriter . . .

In addition to those comments another editor named Guide Den Broeder read my contributions and described me as an expert, AND WhatamIdoing has referred to me as an expert in some arguments against me e.g. here - http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:Posturewriter&diff=prev&oldid=225855935 . . .

However, when SmokeyJoe assessed my contributions as those of a "well qualified academic" WhatamIdoing rushed in to say that I was just a field sports coach in the research project here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Requests_for_comment/Posturewriter#RE:_Responses_to_comments_to_User:SmokeyJoe.E2.80.99s_suggested_outcome

(I was actually the designer and co-ordinator of a medical research programme, and another person was delegated the role of field instructor)

They are also not telling you that I often found NPOV editors who agreed that my contributions were complying with all policy e.g. in the third paragraph here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:WhatamIdoing/Archive_2#Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment.2FPosturewriter . . . with the words "To be honest, in my opinion, it's actually a lot better and far more detailed than the one that is currently up and I can't find anything which is COI, unsourced (97 different sources quoted!!), or biased" , and here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:Posturewriter/DaCostaDraft&diff=prev&oldid=243449158 , with the words "This article may well come under more scrutiny than many other articles written on Wikipedia so do be prepared for lots of suggestions. However, at the end of it all I really believe we can produce a brilliant article. Keep up the good work! " , . . Such favorable words were undermined by my critics who spent a lot of time criticisng the NPOV editors, and referring to them as being medically ignorant and not expert enough in the topic area to be able to judge the merits of the evidence e.g. in the fourth paragraph here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:WhatamIdoing/Archive_2#Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment.2FPosturewriter http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:WhatamIdoing/Archive_2#Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment.2FPosturewriter.

However it was not their role to assess just content, but to also assess layout, presentation, referencing , verifiablity, neutrality, and the appropriateness in relation to the relevant policies.

They are also not telling you that the fundamental principles of Wikipedia are superior to the policies, and that the information is supposed to become superior to printed encyclopedias by getting it from "all" sources, not just "medical sources", and that the only way of complying with neutral point of view policy (NPOV) is to include "all" information, not just one side of any ten sided story. They are also not telling you that Wikipedia invites "all" members of the public to contribute, not just cherry-picked individuals with particular backgrounds and associated bias.

When they refer to my "non-mainstream" ideas they are referring to my suggestion from "the Posture Theory" that poor posture compresses the ribs and makes the muscles between them tender and prone to occasional sharp chest pains etc and that poor posture also compresses the lungs and strains the breathing muscles to produce a tendency to sighing respiration etc. By contrast one of their favorite mainstream ideas is a highly complicated mix of obscure contradictory arguments such as there is no heart disease therefore the pain is imaginary and must be caused by anxiety, a fear of heart disease, and subconscious psychological problems that are so mysterious that nobody can find them. The editors are trying to bury their ideas in jargon such as "somatoform autonomic dysfunction" etc, that normal readers would have no hope of understanding or questioning, and would therefore be expected to blindly believe.

4.When they are referring to Da Costa's syndrome as "a vague 19th century syndrome" they are deliberately misrepresenting a condition that is so clear and distinct that in 1987, more than 100 years after it was first identified, Oglesby Paul wrote "It is important to be able to recognise the condition irrespective of the label used. The diagnosis is usually not difficult for an interested reasonably inteligent physician" here http://heart.bmj.com/cgi/content/abstract/58/4/306 . . . and it affects 2-4% of the population and has been subject to major debates during that time re; is it heart disease or not, is it mental or physical etc. (note that 2-4% of the population is 200 to 400 million people globally)

They also don't want readers to know that it is now mixed in with the common labels of chronic fatigue syndrome because they don't want to add to the existing controveries on that topic, or have those groups of individuals having a closer look at the evidence from history. They also don't want you to know about the disputes because Wikipedia policy places importance on considering "all" points of view, "especially" with "controversial" topics.

They also don't want you to know that the arguments of history were "heated" because they don't want you to realise that anyone who presents information on the topic is likely to get hostile responses from a whole host of individuals with strong bias or prejudices. re; they don't want you to notice that their hostile response to me is the result of them having a strong POV or undisclosed COI. i.e. they want you to think that their criticism of me is purely objective so that you will focus on possible faults in me, and that you don't stop to take a close look at their motives.

An example of desperate measures at removing the information can also be seen in a series of anonymous vandalistic deletions which started on 9-5-08 here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Da_Costa%27s_syndrome&diff=next&oldid=210262939 . . . soon after gordonofcartoon added the cruft, or rubbish comment on the page. see more details here

They also say that I am promoting my own ideas when in fact they deleted all information about it twelve months ago and I haven't put it back. However someone else established the Da Costa page, and after I started adding to it someone else gave it a subsection with the title of "history". When they deleted my research they said that they appreciated my other contributions here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Da_Costa%27s_syndrome/Archive_1#I.27m_going_to_go_read_WP:CIVIL_now . . . so I started adding to the history section by basing my contributions on the information provided in J.M.DaCosta's original research paper of 1871. I then proceeded to fill in the gaps in the history of research by referring to the findings of 60 different medical researchers from all medical specialties, with the aim of eventually having the most important findings and ideas arranged in a clear and logical chronological order, and tracing it through the changes in labelling to 2008. They don't tell you that they were sysetmatically removing all information that they didn't want the readers to see and replacing it with information that supported their POV. They were invited to do their own account of the article for comparison but they refused to do that by aguing that they didn't have the time because they were too busy editing other articles. They also don't tell you that their idea of history only includes the period from 1863 to 1900 which I wrote and they tried to discredit.

5. When they say it is generally considered an anxiety or psychosomatic disorder, they are not telling readers that there have been more than 100 theories and labels about it for the past 100 years, and vast amounts of evidence of physical cause have been found e.g. here http://heart.bmj.com/cgi/content/abstract/58/4/306. The editors have been deleting all significant evidence of physical cause on the basis that the scientific evidence from the past is "old" "out of date", "obsolete" or "superceded". I have told them many times before that research papers from the past are acceptable in history sections for "obvious" reasons according to Wikipedia Sourcing policy, but they just ignore that and pretend that they haven'l lost that argument many times in the past 12 months. Other editors have told them the same thing e.g. at the top of WhatamIdoing's talk page here - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:WhatamIdoing/Archive_2#Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment.2FPosturewriter

Note also, in 1947 a researcher finally found the real physical cause of the breathlessness of DaCosta's syndrome which was abnormal function of the breathing muscle here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Da_Costa%27s_syndrome&diff=prev&oldid=186305009. Confirmation of that discovery disproved the previous ideas that it was just 'subjective' or 'imaginary' and the fact that the breathlessness is physically based will never change. It had a proven physical cause in 1947, is still the same symptom with the same cause in 2009, and will still be the same in 2050. WhatamIdoing has removed that reference, and therefore the evidence of that fact twice e.g. here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Da_Costa%27s_syndrome&diff=190462118&oldid=190379699, and keeps on inferring that the sighing respiration is due to anxiety induced hyperventilation. If readers were informed of the breathing abnormality at least half of them would have enough sense to question the anxiety theories, but WhatamIdoing obviously wants Wikipedia readers to blindly believe the anxiety theory without questioning them, and so deliberately removes the evidence that sheds doubt on it. It is the equivalent of treating Wikipedia readers with contempt, as if they are cattle to be herded, or mushrooms to be farmed, re; kept in the dark and fed on b.s. Wikpedia readers are not a crop of mushrooms, and editors such as WhatamIdoing should not be allowed to use Wikipedia as their own private mushroom farm. (does WhatamIdoing have a degree in social engineering???, and is someone paying WhatamIdoing to sit on the computer for up to 16 hours a day and do up to 100 edits or more a day???? and 20,000 edits in four years. Are we all supposed to believe without question that all that activity is voluntary???? or should intelligent people consider the possibility that they may be establishing a reputation for service and integrity so that they can control content - if and when necessary - and when they are criticised by people like me they come up with the innocent, sanctimonious argument - "Are you question my integrity?" etc. Anyone who isn't naive would question the motives of such an editor, and it is not uncivil to ask that question. It is common sense.

Also, even if there is no money involved, the selective nature of the editing and the hostility of the response indicate some sort of prejudice or bias that could be related to their health status, class, educational qualificatons, and or professional or group affiliations.

Finally, WhatamIdoing has previously received a medical trophy for a Wikipedia article on fatigue here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:WhatamIdoing/Archive_2#Fatigue, and would therefore be bringing a personal POV to this subject, given that DCS involves chronic fatigue.

5B. Note also that WhatamIdoing has criticised me several times with the derisive arguments that my references are "old" in one quote, and "obsolete" in another, and "out-of-date" in another, because they were published more than ten years ago, and, yet again, as quoted above "Of course, the condition is entirely superseded, so most of the refs are from before most editors were born", and again from the arbitration page where he told the other editors that my contributions were poor quality because some of my references (about the history of DCS) were "from nearly a century ago". However, if you look at the reference list on the Da Costa's page of 2-2-09 here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Da_Costa%27s_syndrome&diff=268043151&oldid=266976152#References, which they apparently find acceptable, you can see that nine of the eighteen references were published between 1871 and 1993, but because they are being used to suit WhatamIdoing's point of view they have not been deleted. That is just one of my criticis many double standards, but they predictably argue that their use of "old" references is justifiable for "different" "policy" reasons, and they will try and convince me and you that I am not intelligent enough to understand the difference.

5C. Note my critics excessive emphasis on all things psychological on the Da Costa's syndrome article page, and their preference for the W.H.O. use of "Somatoform Autonomic Dysfunction" . . . That is jargon that no-one is supposed to understand, but the word somatoform essentially means "imaginary" which contradicts the scientific evidence of physical cause that WhatamIdoing is selectively deleting. The whole terminology is also generally regarded as "wastebasket" diagnosis e.g. in the second last paragraph of this section here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Da_Costa%27s_syndrome/Archive_1#Dorlands_as_a_reliable_source

Note that patients are not rubbish just because it is deemed "official" . . . "scientific" . . . "opinion", and it is not appropriate for Wikipedia to be used as a waste bin for humans. It is also not their place to exclude the opinion of medical consumers. WhatmIdoing has also added victim blaming exercises by referring in an oblique way to "compensation", and implying that patients are faking the symptoms to get sympathy or monetary gain, and WhatamIdoing should stop adding victim blaming double talk to the notes in the references by referring to DCS patients as cowards who need to be given dignity e.g. in reference number 4. here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Da_Costa%27s_syndrome&diff=next&oldid=214695896#References. The editors of Wikipedia need to stop acting like intellectual cowards by excluding the opinion of medical consumers, and start winning their arguments on the basis of merit, instead of by stealth and default. You can see the evidence in the history of edits for the Da Costa's syndrome page between late December 2007 and December 2008.

6. When they say it is "overall an unimportant article" that they could turn into "a little gem of an article" they are choosing their words to deviously downplay a major topic of heated debates and controversy for 100 years, and want other Wikipedia editors and readers to think that it is trivial so that nobody reads the evidence. It is the equivalent of them trying to convince you that the model T-Ford is overall an unimportant motor vehicle in the history of human transportation, but we could turn it into a quaint little match box toy to amuse children.

7. When they imply that the information that I provided for the article page is "actively wrong", and that there are more important articles such as meningitis or mental health for them to consider, they are simply trying to trivialise the topic that was already in Wikipedia before I started on it, and that they have put an enormous amount of time into trying to argue about, and losing. They haven't provided any evidence that the information is wrong because they can't. They just expect the readers to believe their casual statement as if the pearls of wisdom and drips of honesty and innocence flow from their slippery brows.

Also, when they say that it is their goal to produce an article on DCS that is "not actively wrong" they are not telling you that they have always had the opportunity to modify it, or abbreviate it, or to provide their own references and comments. However, they chose to delete my contributions in whole slabs. Also, since then, they have had the opportunity to present their version of the topic but refused. They argue that they haven't got time to do a few pages about the topic, yet they have had the time to do more than 100 pages of criticising.

Furthermore, you also need to know that they want you to believe that Da Costa's syndrome is generally regarded as an anxiety or mental disorder. They are not telling you that they are deleting all significant evidence of physical cause to give you that impression. By contrast I have been writing the whole "history" of DCS, not just the history of ideas taken from psychology journals, or journals that have that bias. There have, in fact. been 100 years of heated debates about the cause of DCS, and more than 100 labels and ideas on cause. They are trying to convince you that my account of the whole history of DCS is "actively wrong", and that their account of the modern psychological theories is the only correct way of writing about the history of the subject.

They are also trying to convince you that the history of the topic is "cruft" which is their word for too much detail, with a sweeping broom symbol on the note to carry the dual insult of rubbish e.g. here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Da_Costa%27s_syndrome&diff=208737181&oldid=208705270 . . .

The entire page of information was then slab deleted by anonymous vandals shortly afterwards here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Da_Costa%27s_syndrome&diff=next&oldid=210262939 . . . and the two editors said that they weren't the anonymous editors, and that they didn't know who they were, and criticised me for asking the question, and later argued that I had falsely accused them of using anonymous editors as their sockpuppets on the RFC page item 3 here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment/Posturewriter#Evidence_of_disputed_behavior.

My critics described it as cruft again here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Da_Costa%27s_syndrome&diff=next&oldid=212440419

However, they have left the early discussion from 1863 to 1900 and deleted everything from 1900 to 2008 e.g. here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Da_Costa%27s_syndrome&diff=212440419&oldid=211817271

They want you to believe that their motive was to give the original history a fair showing, when if fact it is just there as a misleading token, They also want you to believe that they deleted the information from 1900 onwards because it was a nice rounded date at the end of the century. In fact they cherrypicked that time because the next entry referred to the 1916 observations of Sir James MacKenzie who described the abnormal pooling of blood in the abdominal and peripheral veins, which results in an inefficient return of blood to the heart and brain causing problems with exercise, and tiredness. That is significant information about the physcial basis of the symptoms which I previously added here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Da_Costa%27s_syndrome&diff=211817271&oldid=211269450.

WhatamIdoing does not want you to know that the whole purpose of the past 100 years of research was to determine whether the symptoms were real or imaginary, and physical or mental, and that the real physical basis of most of the symptoms has already been found.

For example researchers in the 1940's discovered abnormal function of the breathing muscle which proved that the breathlessness was physical not mental, and "objective" and not just "subjective". i.e. "real" and not "imaginary" e.g. here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Da_Costa%27s_syndrome&diff=186305009&oldid=185756410

WhatamIdoing has selectively deleted that information several times on the trumped up grounds that it was "old", "out-of-date", or "cruft" (rubbish - because it was too much detail that wasn't necessary or relevent to modern theories, and that modern readers didn't need to know and wouldn't be interested in it anyway).

After carefully deleting all of the scientifically proven evidence of physical cause WhatamIdoing then replaced it with the modern opinion that DCS is a type of "somatoform autonomic dysfunction". The word "somatoform" is generally used as a synonym for "imaginary", and the term "somatoform autonomic dysfunction" is rarely used and is "officially" recognised and defined, but for all other intents and purposes it is generally regarded as a "wastebasket" label for patients who have illnesses that the doctor doesn't understand.

Wikipedia is supposed to be written in plain English so that ordinary people can understand it, and I have previously criticised WhatamIdoing for trying to bury the subject in jargon. WhatamIdoing lost that argument, and responded by changing the subject and accusing me of policy violations. When I asked members of the general public if they knew the meaning of the term "somatoform autonomic dysfunction" none of them could tell me.

8. When they say that I have finally given up getting my name and website into the article they are trying to create the false illusion that I am trying hard to add information to Wikipedia for self-promotional purposes - which I am not.

They have slab deleted all information about my research and ideas twice in the past, and completely disregarded all discussion about it. Guido den Broeder told them that there had been no information about me or my ideas in Wikipedia for six months on a previous COI page here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:Posturewriter&diff=prev&oldid=225855935, so they did not have a case of Conflict of Interest against me. I haven't bothered to replace the information for the past year because it isn't necessary, and because if I did my two critics would immediately delete it anyway. I am writing about other peoples research in the history section etc, all properly supported by top quality references. Also if I wanted to promote myself I would have put an identifying photo on the cover, or in the pages of my 1000 page book, but I didn't. My critics are also trying to portray me as a person who gives up easily, when they are actually making a habit of giving up in all evidence based arguments against me, and resorting to policy, spin and trickery, and going to as many other discussion pages to get as many of their friends as possible to help them block me. There is only one of me and they have recruited at least twenty of their friends to help them win arguments againts me. I prefer to deal with these things on my own, but they always work as a team of two and desperately search far and wide for more help. Also when one of them says HVS is ES, and the other says it isn't, I don't have to argue because they defeat themselves. Also they started one of the COI pages with the statement "is this close enough to COI", which means "No! it is not COI" . . . In order to clarify how absurd that is I can give you a similar example; They would argue that you was doing 55 km/hr in a 60 km/hr speed zone, and then ask the judge if it was close enough to breaking the speed limit for him you to have your drivers licence suspended for life.

9. When they say that I am violating COI policy (Conflict of Interest), they are not telling you that all information about my ideas was deleted a year ago, and they are not mentioning these previous quotes from another editor that can be seen by scrolling down to the relevant dates here - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Conflict_of_interest/Noticeboard/Archive_24#Da_Costa.27s_syndrome_take_.232 . . . "I don't care what he may have done half a year ago. He does not need to be stopped, since he is not promoting anything or adding any original research to the article now. Guido den Broeder (talk) 17:29, 20 May 2008" . . . and a few days later . . . "I see nothing in his recent contributions that is related to his personal theory. Most of these diffs are ancient. Guido den Broeder (talk) 17:24, 20 May 2008".

My critics are telling you that I am deliberately using Wikipedia to promote myself, when I am repeatedly telling them that I don't want my name mentioned unless I say so, because I prefer privacy, and they are using my name at the top of discussion pages, or deliberately archiving their own page so that my Wikipedia ID is at the top e.g. here - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:WhatamIdoing/Archive_2#Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment.2FPosturewriter . . . where all their friends can see them making personal attacks on me, and, that placement is an obvious tactic aimed at getting their friends to join in the criticism. They have mentioned my real name at the top of the first page of criticism against me, and named my theory, and linked to my website many more than I have mentioned it myself e.g. here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Conflict_of_interest/Noticeboard/Archive_24#Da_Costa.27s_syndrome_take_.232

They have taken every opportunity to induce other editors into demanding that I provide more information about myself under the pretense of revealing my COI. It has been obvious to me that they want to get as much information as possible to harass me. They then keep up their nonsense arguments which I paraphrase "See - told ya so, this is just another example of Posturewriter being "self-identifed" (with the snide innuendo of - for self-promotion purposes).

Also note that I have told them before that when they started asking for information about me the only way of providing it was by placing a new section about myself of my own website for them to see, and when they started deleting the information that I have provided for Wikipedia, I started putting it onto my website because I have no intentions of wasting it. I then started adding full reviews on my website so that I could abbreviate them later for wikipedia, and they have been arguing that I have been using wikipedia as a dumping ground for my reviews.

10. When they say that I am adding bona fide references it is true. All 60 of the references are in accordance with wikipedia sourcing policy requirements. Most are exceptional quality such as those of Sir James MacKenzie, and Sir Thomas Lewis who were knighted for their contributions to medicine, and Paul Dudley White, and other scholars and professors from Harvard Medical school etc.

However, when they say I am only using those that support my own views, they are not telling you that I added reference to J.M.DaCosta's original research paper called "On Irritable heart", because they didn't, and that they got their favorite label "Soldiers Heart" from the title of a childrens fiction novel, and moved it into a position of prominence at the top of the page by using "hatnote policy" here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Da_Costa%27s_syndrome&diff=215793876&oldid=215793297.

I have added sixty good quality references from all types of sources, which represents all points of view, and therefore Neutral Points of View (NPOV), and my main critic, WhatamIdoing has only added 12 references in 12 months, including some which were simple definitions from dictionaries or websites, and the remaining nine had psychiatric labels in the name of the article or journal, and represent "extreme bias", and contain notes which are 'victim blaming exercises", and they exclude the opinion of medical consumers. My critics are brazenly violating NPOV policy with their twelve cherry picked references, while putting a spin on their actions by accusing me of violating it when I used 60 references from all sources, including theirs. For example, when I saw their link to Oglesby Paul's article in the reference list, I read it, and provided a one page review of his ten page article about the complex history of of Da Costa's syndrome, and they deleted it, and replaced it with one sentence about anxiety here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Da_Costa%27s_syndrome&diff=190379699&oldid=190352656 , and they continued to misrepresent the article again six months later here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Da_Costa%27s_syndrome#Oglesby_Paul

11. When they say that the evidence that I am providing from history has been superseded, they are trying to hide the fact that the evidence of history discredits a lot of modern ideas, and they are virtually trying to convince readers that history can be properly understood by reading this mornings newspaper. They are also expecting you to believe that scientific facts that have been erased from history, or erased from Wikipedia, are no longer scientific facts.

12.They move along to imply that I am deliberately adding (*gasp* - their word) original research which they describe as a violation of OR policy (no Orignal Research allowed), and "of course all of this violates a variety of other policies". What they don't tell you is that after they deleted reference to my own research they added 'that they appreciated my other efforts". They obviously thought that I would not be able to add any more, so when I added a reference to a 1947 research paper on the proven physical cause of breathlessness, they accused me of violating Synthesis policy by adding information that supports my theory. I provided a reference which stated that breathlessness affected 93% of DCS patients and mentioned the obvious fact that every person who wrote about DCS would have to mention research studies related to that symptom, but they simply ignored that comment and deleted the information anyway. I then waited for them to add information and references to fill in the gaps in the history from 1863 to 1940, and from 1980 to 2008 but they did nothing. I therefore started. by adding references from the 1940's and they accused me of deliberately choosing papers that were old because they supported my theory. They then "moved the goalposts" and said that I must use only "secondary sources" of information which are reviews of research in reputable medical journals. When I added a 1998 review by Streeton in the Journal of the American Medical Association, which is the most famous medical journal in the world, they deleted it because, according to them, Streeton was not an expert on the topic and it was just an op-ed item (opposite the editorial page).

They are also not telling you that when I read one of the links that they provided I found that it was an irrelevent children's fiction novel that wasn't suitable according to WP:MEDRS, and they said that reading it, and then giving my analysis of it was violating "original research" policy in item 4. here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment/Posturewriter#Evidence_of_disputed_behavior . . . What they are essentially saying is that they can put anything they want on the page and nobody is allowed to criticise it.

They are telling you that I have violated multiple policies, but what they are not telling you is that every time I comply with one policy they find an endless supply of other policies which they invent as their excuse to block my contributions, and they leave comments on policy pages to add or modify Wikipedia policies to suit the easy banning of SPA's in the future etc etc.

They have also written a lot of words trying to convince readers that they are policy experts, and that I have a poor understanding or comprehension of simple policies, when in fact, I fully understand how they are misrepresenting policy to deceive people and to block me. For example when they say repeatedly that I am violating Medical Sourcing policy by using out-of-date references they are only quoting the main paragraphs of WP:MEDRS policy and not directing me or the other editors to paragraphs further down the policy page which state that older references are relevant to the history sections of article for OBVIOUS reasons. They even repeat that accusation again on the POV page with the words that you have just read . . . "Of course, the condition is entirely superseded, so most of the refs are from before most editors were born"

When they say that I don't understand the meaning of the word "consensus" they are not telling you that I studied Group Psychology at tertiary level for four years, and consensus is a feature of human group interaction. They are also not telling you that they have been tag teaming against me as a group of two so that they can always say that it is two to one againts me, when in fact it is one tag team against one person, and they frequently use the word "we" think this and "we" think that to create the illusion of greater support for their argument than actually exists. They also don't tell you that when they lose a case such as COI number one, they start up COI number two with words such as "can we revisit this one" here - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Conflict_of_interest/Noticeboard/Archive_24#Da_Costa.27s_syndrome_take_.232 , and when they lost the case on the MFD page they say words such as "this failed on procedural grounds" and go onto an RFC page, without telling anyone that an editor who keeps bringing up new cases relentlessly is "forum shopping" which is a case of them violating guidelines of conduct, and they don't tell you about the general policy of acceptiing their defeat and moving on, instead of persisting relentlessly until they get the outcome they want. In fact, I have told editors that my recent banning has been the result of other editors violating RFC closing policy, and barging in on an orderly arbitration process to block it, and none of them has challenged me, presumably because they couldn't. They just ignore what I have said about them, and they ignore the fact that they have violated policy by using an administrator who they call the "cavalry", and ban me anyway.

13.They also falsely say, without evidence, that I am violating the truth, however, they are not saying what truth, because I have given factual and referenced information to Wikipedia which can be easily verified . . . and after they wrote volumes of words to convince everyone that I am the publisher of a thousand page book . . . they have the audacity to tell them that I am WP:COPYVIO - which means - breaching my own copyright???? - which is ridiculous.

In fact, at the end of a lengthy dicussion about the copyright accusation here Gordonofcartoon's exact words were "Since your identity was declared, the copyright issue has always been an irrelevancy", but they just keep bringing up the same arguments over and over again without any regard for how many times the subjects have been discussed before, and that they have lost repeatedly.

Furthermore, when WhatamIdoing argues that I have violated WP:RS policy it refers to Wikipedia Reliable Sources of information. What you were not told is that one of my sources was a Streeton review from the editorial section of the 1998 edition of the Journal of the American Medical Association, which WhatamIdoing described as an 11 year old op-ed piece written by a non-expert on the topic.

By contrast WhatamIdoing wanted to give prominence to the label of Soldier's Heart which is one of the many alternative labels for Da Costa's syndrome. That was achieved by moving a reference to a book by that title from the end of the Da Costa's page to the top line where it is the first thing that readers will see here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Da_Costa%27s_syndrome&diff=215793876&oldid=215793297. I therefore read it and found that it was irrelevant, but when I criticised them for using a Children's fiction novel as a reference they argued that I didn't understand hat note policy. They argued that hatnote policy was used to to help the blind and disabled navigate their way through Wikipedia to find articles with the same title here. Gordonfcartoon then added, poems, plays, and telemovies with that title to the linked page. You have also not been told that the "hatnote" has since been removed by another editor for being inappropriate and offensive.

Note that my two critics also know that I am older and more experienced at dealing with controversy than they are, but they have been choosing their words and using "spin" in an attempt to create the false impression that I am younger than they are, and that I have poor comprehension, and am emotionally fragile, and easily upset. An extreme example can be seen after I criticised them for using the childrens fiction novel as a reference for the medical page. Their "spin" involved making themselves look good by justifying their foolish actions with hatnote policy, and then they tried to make me look childlike and emotionally delicate by using the following words . . . "PW, I just want to add that I'm sorry you read that book. Paulsen makes a living from writing deliberately depressing books to promote his anti-war/anti-military views. He has a particular talent for sympathetically disgusting descriptions. I have read about ten of them and only found one that was worth my time. They are, unfortunately, officially recommended or required reading in many, many American schools. WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:06, 30 June 2008 . . .

Note also that they then archived half the page so that their sentence was the last that readers would see at the end of the first 6 months of discussion. They were obviously attempting to leave a "lasting" false impression here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Da_Costa%27s_syndrome/Archive_1#Comments_on_the_novel_.E2.80.9CSoldier.E2.80.99s_Heart.E2.80.9D . . . My final comment is that if my critics were depressed by reading children's fiction they need to grow up, and if they are fond of childrens fiction novels they should edit childrens pages, not medical pages.

14. They then complain that their existing "Attitude Readjustment Tools" can't stop me in Australia, and link the text to a Lart webpage which refers to new editors as "newbies", and those who are adding information to Wikipedia which they don't want the readers to see are called "flame bait", and then they add links to "flame wars", and flame notices, posters or emails, where they leave the names of "newbies". so that their friends will see it. Those friends can then act as "flame throwers" or "cavalry" by coming from nowhere into an arbitration page and impose instant blocks under the presence of being completely independent and uninvolved or unbiased (to paraphrase "by the way I just happened to notice this page . . . it was just a coincidence, honest it was"). Am I supposed to assume that they are an eraser gang of juveniles in adult bodies, or perhaps they are trying to intimidate me with fairy tales or cryptic innuendo carrying the threat of coming to my own home to do me harm???? or getting their international friends to do so!!!!! Am I supposed to hire a bodyguard, or put a paper mache gnome on the front door mat???? Are they trying to make me anxious or paranoid, or are they generously giving me the opportunity of proving that they are a stupid gang of trolls????

15. The criticism just continues endlessly with spin after spin, and goes on to say "It's back at WP:COI/N for a second go-round" (it's actually the third time). They are not telling you that the "Conflict of Interest" page number one failed, and that my two critics had just lost an argument against me here - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Da_Costa%27s_syndrome/Archive_1#WP:SYNTH.3F . . . by contradicting each other about Hyperventilation syndrome and the Effort Syndrome which I explained in the second comment here - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Da_Costa%27s_syndrome/Archive_1#Proposed_page_move . . . and that neither of them had read past the first paragraph of Rosen's research paper on the topic. The first critic Gordonofcartoon added several hundred words of criticism to the COI page here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Conflict_of_interest/Noticeboard/Archive_24#Da_Costa.27s_syndrome_take_.232 . . . and then the other critic named WhatamIdoing, who had been co-operating against me for months comes into the page and says with words that I paraphrase . . ."by the way, I have been away from Wikpedia for a while and just noticed this page by sheer coincidence - does any one mind me adding my 2c worth." . WhatamIdoing then adds several hundred more words of criticism faster than I cared to respond to, so I sat back and watched until the dust settled. After 5000 words of criticism another editor assumed that there was so much evidence against me that I could not possibly defend myself and decided that I must have breached COI. I then spent a week or so preparing a 2500 word defense from several weeks of notes (i.e. half as many words as my critics) here - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Da_Costa%27s_syndrome/Archive_1#Response_to_5000_words_of_criticism_in_the_twelve_days_between_12-5-08_and_22-5-08 and then, at the end of that essay Gordonofcartoon added the offensively dismissive remark "please cut this readable length", indicating that he had absolutely no intention of reading anything I put on the discussion page, and later implying that I didn't understand paragraph for paragraph discussion conventions.

16. In the last paragraph WhatamIdoing forecasts the intention "to team up with other disgusted editors to be so mean and rude to the SPA that he leaves in disgust", hence the forum shopping for help, and the insults continued. However, as I advised them, I have had 30 years of experience at dealing with controversial topics and am fully aware that some people will have strong views and will resort to insults. In Wikipedia the process of insulting a person for the purpose of making them leave is called trolling, and is a violation of several policies, including WP:CIVIL here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Civility&diff=279120817&oldid=279120346#Engaging_in_incivility.

Finally, when WhatamIdoing (a hostile critic) refers to my contributions as "nonsense", it needs to be put into context with an NPOV editors opinion here "To be honest, in my opinion, it's actually a lot better and far more detailed than the one that is currently up and I can't find anything which is COI, unsourced (97 different sources quoted!!), or biased" here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:WhatamIdoing/Archive_2#Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment.2FPosturewriter

Note that my statements about Da Costa's syndrome were actually based on 60 top quality references that are all verifiable. Hence, WhatamIdoing is trying to convince you that highly respected scientists in the history of research were writing nonesense????

My second critics remarks; his ID code is Gordonofcartoon:  

Seconded, and an update for general edification. The issue has been finally settled (I hope) by an indefinite block. It went to an RFC (which had a strong consensus, to no effect, that the editor concerned should edit articles away from pet topic). The problem trundled on with continual griping (invariably lengthy) on Talk pages while the editor wrote a personal new draft of the article (critics unwelcome). Then he chose to put it back against consensus into mainspace. Finally I raised it at Requests for Arbitration. They were cautiously moving toward accepting before the cavalry arrived in the form of admins who were prepared to bring blocks, ultimately an indefinite one for disruptive conduct.
This has taken about a year to settle. At one level, I don't blame anyone: it could argued that any particular report (e.g. at WP:ANI) only sees a snapshot of the situation and it doesn't look to bad. But on the other hand, the user hasn't been remotely civil. For six months, he has openly flouted WP:AGF and WP:NPA and WP:CIVIL, with an extended userspace attack on two editors called The Motivations, Strategies, and Tactics of my Critics, and inflammatory language like editor X's "web of deceit" and "juvenile duplicity" and editor Y "swinging through the wiki trees beating his breast and yelling his typical bark". And yet you get admins looking at this and saying stuff to the effect of "Oh, I don't see anything here that really constitutes an attack or serious incivility."
And that's not even factoring in the exhausting effect of long-term contact with procedural nitpicking, obfuscation, lying by misquotation etc ("user A says and diff B that my article is wonderful", then you look at the diff and find it doesn't, or it has been quoted out of the context of other editors saying it was crap; so you say so, and get back 1500 words of WP:SOUP saying why it doesn't mean what it seems to mean, and how it's just another example of my critics using their tactics to silence me, and anyhow the procedure wasn't conducted properly because Bilbo von Booger who you got banned because he supported my case said at diff D that ... and so on and on and on and f***ing f***ing on.
As WhatamIdoing says, we need another solution. Gordonofcartoon (talk) 16:57, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

1. My second critic Gordonofcartoon, comes to this page, not being aware of just how obvious it is that the two of them (Gordonofcartoon and WhatamIdoing) have been ganging up on me from the start by arguing against me as a team. (They started the Da Costa's syndrome talk page, and added the first two paragraphs of criticism on 21-12 -07 here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Da_Costa%27s_syndrome/Archive_1 . . . and have made more than 95% of the criticism against me since, and started the final arbitration page against me here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:WhatamIdoing/Archive_2#Requests_for_arbitration_.2F_User:Posturewriter). This POV page is just another obvious example where they try to get other editors to believe them with great floods of unreferenced criticism on a page that they don't think I will notice, and was not told of, and where they think I won't have the opportunity to present my side of the story.

WhatamIdoings comments from last May (2008) escaped my notice until I found Gordonofcartoon adding comments on this POV page (in January 2009) after I had been banned, and that he assumed I would not be able to find or respond to. (They often set up new discussion pages without telling me about them so that decisions will be made by other editors before I get to give my side of the story e.g. here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:WhatamIdoing/Archive_2#Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment.2FPosturewriter, and here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:WhatamIdoing/Sandbox&diff=prev&oldid=243268880)

2. Gordonofcartoon says that the case is finally settled by me being banned on an arbitration page where I said that I would prepare my defense for posting next Sunday. There were about 12 editors voting about 5 to 7 against me when an administrator named Moreschi came in and banned me on the Thursday. That may or may not be a violation of wiki policy, but it is a serious violation of normal common sense justice and fair play, and is essentially a sabotage of the natural course of justice. (Note that Gordonofcartoon had previously set up a discussion on the Administrators noticeboard on 25-8-08 where Moreschi responded to the accusations and I replied. That discussion didn't go any further, so I assumed that it ended in my favor, Moreschi had been absent from the discussions ever since, so I became suspicious of 'behind the scenes' conversations when he suddenly came to the arbitration page to ban me. Arbitration decisions should be made by consensus, or by editors who have had no previous involvement or bias, and if he wanted to dispute anything about my contributions he should have done so six months earlier - that dicscussion can be seen here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/IncidentArchive469#Disruptive_editor_.2F_RFC_failing_to_resolve )

3. Gordonofcartoon also mentions the RFC which is a "Request For Comments" page about me. I notified the editors that I would spend a few weeks preparing a subpage for them to consider, and after about a week another editor named Wizardman came to the page and closed it with comments that I must restrict my contributions to non-DaCosta pages, which Gordonofcartoon refers to derisively as my "PET" topic. According to wikipedia policy, which I checked before starting the subpage, an RFC cannot be closed while contributors are still trying to solve the dispute, and an editor does not have any real authority to impose sanctions. On other pages WhatamIdoing was encouraging editors to pretend that they had authority, and within two days of closing the RFC, my critic WhatamIdoing went to Wizardmans page and awarded him a barnstar for help with "closures of RFC's" in the past few months. I checked and there were no other closures that I could see.

4. When Gordonofcartoon refers to "continual griping" invariably lengthy, you need to understand that he is choosing those words to create a false derogatory impression of my comments which were generally matter-of-fact and objective. He also isn't telling you the facts. I have not one, but two critics working against me who, in my opinion, are trying to drown my truths with great volumes of critcism, often several times a day. After they have argued throughout the week, I generally respond on a Sunday, although sometimes their comments require me to reply immediately or mid week. You need to also consider that most of the time I have simply been adding more information to comply with each new sourcing policy that they require me to meet, and they whinge or gripe about it because they don't want me adding anything.

5. When he says that I prepared "a personal new draft (critics unwelcome)" he is again misrepresenting the facts. There were actually two neutral editors who came to the RFC so I tried to get them to act as policy referees. When they suggested that both parties (me and the tag team) should set up subpages and do versions of the DaCosta's page without interference, I agreed, but Gordonofcartoon snubbed the idea (because he didn't have enough knowledge to do a page), and WhatamIdoing cut and pasted my page and subjected it to 80 points of merciless criticism (nitpicking). It was never intended for me to invite those obvious opponents to my subpage or vice versa. They were to be compiled independently so that good pages could be put together without interference or disruption, and I invited "neutral" editors to assist me put the page together in compliance with policy e.g. here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:SmokeyJoe#Regarding_the_Da_Costa.27s_syndrome_subpage. When I had finished it another editor named Avnjay described it as "honestly" much better than the existing page with no evidence of COI etc here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:WhatamIdoing/Archive_2#Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment.2FPosturewriter

WhatamIdoing immediately responded with another relentless barrage of nitpicking which went on for a month, not only criticising me, but also embarrassing the other editors by describing them as not being experts on the topic and not understanding it, until, as usual, the other editors started agreeing with them. Note that those editors were invited to assess NPOV, and MEDRS, and Verifiability etc, and one of them did, and he agreed with me. WhatamIdoing changed the courteous and orderly discussion into an opportunity to ridicule me, and to turn it into a content dispute, and spent several weeks misrepresenting my comments and taking my words out of context to deceive the other editors into believing that my subpage was wrong.

6. When Gordonofcartoon said that I put it back into mainspace he means that I replaced the existing Da Costa page with what Avnjay described as a "much better one", and when he says that I did it against consensus he is not telling you that I was the only one to do a subpage. You need to also consider that I sent messages to both of the NPOV editors to do it for me and one of them didn't reply for months, and the other one made indirect comments elsewhere that "silence is consensus" and "be bold". I also left a message on the "Editors Assistance" page asking for a neutral editor to replace the existing page with my subpage but no-one agreed, or disagreed for about a month, so I replaced it myself. My critics deleted it, I replaced it, etc, and they blocked me for being disruptive by replacing the older page with a better one. (They misrepresented the three revert rule (3RR) to accuse me of it, and they used careful timing and teaming to avoid that rule themselves).

7. When Gordonofcartoon said that "he" raised it on an arbitration page (on Monday 26-1-09), and later that they were cautiously moving towards accepting, he is referring to the fact that he set up an arbitration page to discuss having me banned from adding information to the Da Costa page. At that stage the outcome was five editors in favor of me, to seven against. You can also notice that at 8:37 on Tuesday 27-1-09 I gave an initial response to the criticism and told the arbitrators that I would be happy to present a fuller response on the following Sunday, unless requested to do so earlier. Within 24 hours WhatamIdoing presented a large essay of misleading criticism (at 20:25 on Tuesday 27-1-09) and knew that if I had the opportunity to respond to it I could have easily done so. (I mention that because it is the backgound circumstantses for Moreschi's urgent decision to ban me on Wednesday 28-1-09). It is obvious that they tried their hardest to ban me before Sunday 1-2-09 because they knew that they had lost almost every previous argument against me, and didn't want to take any chances of me winning again. When Gordonofcartoon says that "the "cavalry"!!!!! arrived in the form of admins who were prepared to block" he means Moreschi, who is only one of the admins who suddenly interupted the orderly discussion of the other arbitrators and banned me on Wednesday here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration&diff=prev&oldid=266981397#Comment_from_Moreschi . . . before I was due to give my defense on Sunday. (Note that when they say that "the cavalry arrived???? - they are referring to "their cavalry" - part of an organised group - in a flame war??? - and they accused me of being "disruptive", and starting an edit war?????). The only question here is did Moreschi know all the facts, and that he was the cavalry, or had he been misled into acting as the cavalry re; was he an outsider who believed all of their insulting remarks about me, and did he ban me without properly investigating the facts????

When Gordonofscartoon says that I was blocked for disruptive conduct he is not telling you that I was doing everything I could to comply with process and policy, and that they were using every policy and process that they could find to disrupt my opportunity to present my side of the story.

You can see the arbitrtion process, and each persons comments by scrolling down the page here http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration&diff=prev&oldid=266981397#User:Posturewriter

8. When Gordonofcartoon says that the process took a year to settle he is referring to the fact that he tried multiple items of jargon as a ruse hoping to confuse me, and multiple policy reasons to disrupt my contributions, and went to multiple forums to get help because both of my critics working as a team were losing every argument for a year e.g. here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Da_Costa%27s_syndrome/Archive_1 and here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Da_Costa%27s_syndrome, and they have finally blocked me by subverting two processes, namely the RFC which was closed while still active, and Arbitration which was closed by one admin before I was to present my defense.

9. When he says he "doesn't blame anyone" he is trying to convince you that he didn't care but that many other editors were losing their patience and their tempers, when, in fact, the other editors only showed the normal casual interest that you would expect from neutral uninvolved participants in an arbitration process, but Gordonofcartoon was losing his temper and resorting to foul language. He is using that choice of words to downplay his own involvement, and divert attention away from the fact that he tried his hardest to disrupt me for a year with his tag team mate.

10. When he says that a snapshot of any period in the past "doesn't look too bad" he is trying to give the impression that what looks "matter of fact", and "courteous", is not to be believed, because he wants you to believe that I have been violating AGF. In fact I was being courteous despite the criticism. Also, AGF means "Assume Good Faith" in other editors, which I did for a few months until it became obvious that "they were not acting in good faith", and according to Wikipolicy you don't have to keep assuming good faith in people who give evidence that they don't deserve it. (i.e. you don't have to be so naive that you will assume good faith in a bank robber with a bag of cash when he says that the nice bank teller gave it to him for his birthday). Also, despite the fact that I stopped assuming good faith in them, I continued to treat them with courtesy because Wikipedia policy requires it.

Furthermore the idea that all new contributors should assume good faith in everyone else is a good idea for f