Alright. So in this next module we're going to do
some more practice on paragraphs. I'm gonna lead you through the editing of
two more paragraphs, where we go through and kinda bring out the logic, bring out
the organization, improve the organization.
And also do some sentence level editing to make things read more smoothly and to get
rid of extra clutter. So, as I've mentioned with earlier modules
when we're doing kind of, kind of this kind of practice, there's two ways you can
watch the video. You can just watch it straight through and
I'll kind of lead you through how I would approach each of these and edit each of
these. If you want to challenge yourself even a
little bit more. And you've got some extra time and want to
kind of want to test yourself. You could, after I introduce each example,
shut the video off for a moment, pause the video.
And try to edit it on your own. See what you come up with.
And then rejoin the video and kind of compare against my edits just to see how
many of the things that we've been talking about in this class that you can pick up.
Either way is fine to watch the video. So here's the first example.
This was from something I was editing. And it's actually a little bit easier than
the example that we edited in the last module cuz it's something that pretty much
I think everybody can understand without too much background, it's about headaches.
So, I'm just gonna kinda read this and then we'll talk about different, I'm gonna
point out some different things in this, and we'll talk about how to edit it.
So it says, headache is an extraordinarily common pain symptom that virtually
everyone experiences at one time or another.
As a pain symptom, headaches have many causes.
The full range of these causes were categorized by the International Headache
Society in 1988. The IHS distinguishes two broad groups of
headache disorders. Primary headache disorder, and secondary
headache disorders. Secondary headache disorders are a
consequence of an underlying condition, such as a brain tumor, a systemic
infection, or a head injury. In primary head disorders, the headache
disorder is the fundamental problem. It is not symptomatic of another cause.
The two most common types of primary headache disorder are episodic tension
type and migraine. Although, IHS is the most broadly used
recognized classification system, used a brief comment on the others would be
appropriate, especially if there are uses that have epidemiological advantages.
Okay. So, you can, kind of, step back from this
one and see, okay, well, what were they trying to do in this paragraph?
They were trying to, basically, define headaches for you.
There are two types, secondary and primary.
You could see when I'm reading this out loud, you can kind of hear all of the
repetition in there? Just, it's really worry, and there's
probably a lot, the, the purpose of this paragraph is definitional?
There's probably a lot we can cut from this paragraph.
So let me go through and just point out a few things to you.
So one is, you can do what I call a bird tally.
So, I underline all the verbs here, and I'll just point it out to you that.
What do we have? We have, this is a really good task in
revising your own work, it's very easy to go through and circle the verbs, and
that's one thing you can really pay attention to.
So when you count up the verbs in this paragraph we have eight to be verbs,
that's the is, are, was, were, be and am, so as I mentioned last week to be verbs
are kind of weak. You can use them sometimes but you
probably don't want to use them so much because they're boring.
There's two to have verbs, also boring. There's a passive verb, work, categorized
by. And then there's two more, slightly more
lively verbs. Experiences and distinguishes.
Still not the greatest verbs in the world, but at least a little more lively than the
others. So you can see, in terms of verbs, we're
not doing great on verbs. So we wanna change that a little bit.
You can, there's a lot of wordiness I can point out to you in this, paragraph.
So, for example, there's a lot of adverbs. Extraordinarily, virtually, especially.
You get some already missed like at what in time or another.
As a consequence of not symptomatic of fundamentals, one of those kind of empty
words that we can probably edit out. So there's a lot of wordiness here that
we're going to try to edit out, There's an interesting style this author happened to
have, they kind of were a little bit repetitive in a very specific way.
They liked to end one sentence with a particular term, then start the next
sentence with the same term or very. Close to that.
So, for example, in the first sentence, they use the term, common pain symptom.
And then they start the next sentence with, as a pain symptom.
And then they end the next, that sentence with, have many causes.
They start the next sentence with, the full range of these causes.
They end that sentence with The International Headache Society.
And they start the next one with The International Headache Society.
They end the next sentence with secondary headache disorders and then they start the
following sentence with secondary headache disorders.
So you can see that there's this, amazing repetition here.
Somehow they've wanted to end each sentence and start the next sentence with
the same words. That's just obviously too much repetition.
Now repetition isn't always bad but in this case it's just repeatiment and it
doesn't really work. Means there's a lot we can edit out.
One other thing I had to point about this paragraph is that they've done, they've
added at the end like medi comments. So, they, they're telling you about.
Why they chose to write about what they wrote about.
They're giving you this extra information about they're thought process, and why
they chose to include certain things or not to include certain things in this
chapter. And usually that kind of bad comment you
can just go ahead and include what you are going to include and exclude what you are
going to exclude from, from the article, from the chapter.
You don't really need to give the reader all of you thought process behind that,
usually that's not very helpful to the reader.
So I would just delete that whole meta comment there.
Alright, so the next thing we want to do is, we want to take this whole paragraph
we want to kind of just point out all things that are going on, point out the
underlying logic. And again, I am gonna make it kind of a
outline, a kind of idea flowchart. I usually, I'm not gonna write it out in
such great detail but, for the purposes of teaching, this is what I am kind of
sorting out in my brain when I am editing things like this.
So I first asked myself, well, what's the main idea of this paragraph?
Well, that one's pretty easy, actually, it's pretty straightforward.
There are two types of headaches. Primary and secondary headache disorders.
That's the main idea. The author is just really definitional, to
tell you that there's two types of headaches, secondary and primary.
And then, beyond that, what is the author doing?
Well, the author is defining primary, primary headache disorders and secondary
headache disorders. So those are just definitions.
And then beyond that, the author goes ahead and gives you some examples of each
type. So, some illustrative examples of primary
and secondary headache disorders. So it's really a definitional paragraph.
It's not too hard to do this outline, right?
But that's the underlying logic of the paragraph.
And if you kind of figure out, what is the main point?
What's the point of the paragraph? What's the paragraph after?
Then you can use that to help when you're editing to get rid of anything that isn't
pertinent to that main aim of the paragraph.
As we're going along and reorganizing the paragraph, editing the paragraph.
I'm also obviously going to do some sentence level editing.
So I'll show you some sentence level editing starting with the, the very first
sentence of this paragraph. We can edit this a bit so, it says
headache is an extraordinarily common pain symptom that virtually everyone
experiences at one time or another. That's a little bit long winded, right?
So I'm going to get rid of some things, so, headache is, how about just a, notice
that extraordinarily common is the same, is the same as virtually everyone
experiences it. So I don't really need to say that twice.
So I could call it common or I could delete the common, and leave in the
virtually everyone experiences. So you could go either way on that but I
took out the common, and just said, headache is a pain symptom that, I changed
virtually to almost. That's a little bit of a stylistic
preference there. That almost everyone experiences.
And I don't think we need that, that, at one time or another.
Just, that almost everyone experiences. And then we get this little repetition
that I pointed out before. As a pain symptom, headaches have many
causes. Well, they actually got rid of that
altogether I didn't think that sentence was particularly helpful it's just that
they are not getting anything specific about those particular causes.
They also then go on to tell you that the full range of these causes were
categorized in a passive voice were categorized by the full range of these
causes were categorized by the IHS. Well, you know what I actually went
through and deleted all of that, because I can just go ahead and say how the IHS
categorized them. And then I don't need to tell the author,
obviously if I'm giving the categories from the IHS, the, the IHS must have
categorized them. I'm gonna get rid of the fact that they
did this categories in 1988. I don't really think that's an important
detail. Unless the author came back to me and said
that was really important. So I'm gonna start at the International
Headache Society. And then we get to distinguishes two broad
groups of headaches. I'm going to shorten that a little by just
saying groups. The International Headache Society groups
headache disorders. And then I'm going to say, into two types
based on cause, primary headache disorders and secondary headache disorders.
So I'm going to get in a little extra bit that they're grouping the headache
disorders or groups headaches I think would be slightly better, groups headaches
in to two types based on cause. So that gets the idea across of the, of
the sentence that I deleted and wrote back in there.
So that gets the you know ideal that's it's based on cause the primary and
secondary distinction. So we're going to edit that altogether and
this is the main ideal of the paragraph. Headaches is a pain symptom that almost
everyone experiences. The international headache society groups
headaches in two times based on cause it gets that little information in that it's
a definition based on cause based on primary headache disorders and secondary
headache disorders. So check, I've hit the main idea of the
paragraph. Now we're going to get to the next ideas
of the paragraph. So, the paragraph goes along and starts
defining secondary and primary headache disorders for you.
So I'm gonna point out something about these, some things about these two
sentences that we can fix a little bit. So since secondary headache disorders are
a consequence of an underlying condition. Now notice that it's kind of backwards
order right? They're saying the cause, you know the
effect came from the cause, it's sort of backwards.
They do this twice. They actually do this as well, it is not
symptomatic of another cause. So they it's like effect before cause.
It's the illogical order. So you kind of want to, again that goes
against logic that most people are use to thinking of, so you kind of want to change
that if you can to have cause come before effect if possible.
Just one little point, thing to point out. Again we get that repetition in primary
headache disorders, the headache disorder. Obviously we don't need to repeat that
twice there. We get some empty words.
Is the fundamental problem. I could probably cut all of that without
losing anything. And then another thing to point out here,
it's just kind of interesting the, the way the human brain works is I really want
primary to come before secondary. Probably a lot of you feel the same way,
right. We, you want the first thing to come
before the second thing. It's just the natural ordering of things.
So I want the author to define the primary headaches first in the paragraphs, and
then the secondary headaches second. It's just the natural, logical order.
So I would change that around. So I looked at all of that and I changed
some things around so that I put the primary headache first and secondary
headache second. And so here's my edited version kinda
fixing all of these things I just pointed out to you.
So, in primary headache disorders the headache itself is the main complaint.
The two most common types of headache disorders are episodic tension type and
migraine. So notice I got the primary first now the
secondary. Secondary headache disorder result from
and underlying condition such as a brain tumor a systemic infection or a head
injury. So notice how much I was able to weed out.
I rewrote a lot of that. And I've hit now, all of the rest of the
things that I need to hit in this paragraph.
So I've defined, primary and secondary headache disorders.
So I've hit that. Check.
And then I've given the examples of primary and, and secondary headache
disorders. And with the secondary headache disorders
I just ran the examples right into that one sentence.
They, they help even with the definition there.
Okay so we got the sub-supporting on this. We got the examples.
Alright so we're done. So all together here is the edit.
And you can see it's much, much shorter than what we started with.
Headache is a pain symptom that almost everyone experiences.
The IHS groups headaches into to two types based on cause, primary head disorders and
secondary head disorders. In primary head disorders, the head is the
main complaint. The two most common types are episodic
tension and migraine. Secondary head disorders result from an
underlying condition, such as a brain tumor, a systemic infection or head
injury. And you can go back to the outline.
Make sure we hit all the main points. Sure.
We hit all the main points. Good.
All right, so that was a fairly easy one because it was just dealing with
definitions. This one's slightly trickier although
still I think largely definitional. So, let's read through this one.
If you want to pause the video and try this, this one on your own, go for it.
If you want to just follow along with me, I'll kind of lead you along my though
process. So this one says, although the
methodological approaches are similar, the questions posed in classic epidemiology
and clinical epidemiology are different. In classic epidemiology, epidemiologists
pose a question about the etiology of a disease in a population of people.
Causal associations are important to identify because of the causal factor
identified can be manipulated or modified, prevention of diseases possible.
On the other hand, in clinical epidemiology, clinicians pose a question
about the prognosis of a disease in a population of patients.
Prognosis can be regarded as a set of outcomes and their associated
probabilities primary occurrence of some defining event or diagnosis that can be a
symptom, sign, test result or disease. So again, as you're reading this one out
loud. As I'm reading it to you, you can hear
some of the repetition. Some of the kinda awkward phrasing.
So there's a lot we can edit out of this one.
So again, my approach to this, at least in my head, is to kinda figure out, to figure
it out, at first. Just what was the author trying to
accomplish in this paragraph? What's the main take home message, the
main aim of this paragraph? And then beyond that, what are some, what
are all the points that the author needs to get in?
So I kind of make an outline in my head. And I'm gonna actually write it down
explicitly here cuz the main idea of this paragraph is that they wanna tell you
about the differences between classic and clinical epidemiology.
How do those differ? So that's the main idea.
It's a compare contrast essential. And then, the supporting idea's, well, if
they give you the definitions. Classic epidemiology is about disease
epidemiology and preventing disease. In contrast, clinical epidemiology is
about improving prognosis in people who already have diseases.
So that's the supporting ideas, and then beyond that.
The authors are defining a couple of words, in case you don't know what they
are. Since they've said classic epidemiology is
about ideology, they need to define the word, ideology.
And they said clinical epidemiology is about prognosis, so they need to tell you
what prognosis is. So we need some definitions, then.
So that's it. That's the whole main idea of this
paragraph. And that's all of the pieces in this
paragraph. So when we edit it, we're gonna make sure
that we get in all those pieces. And, again, get out anything that doesn't
contribute, to those pieces. And I'm also gonna do a lot of sentence
level editing as we go along here. So we'll start with the very first
sentence. Although the methodological approaches are
similar, the questions posed in classic epidemiology and clinical epidemiology are
different. So we can do a little bit to streamline
this sentence a bit. So, and this is a little wordy, although
the methodological, that word methodological, again approaches are
similar. The questions posed are different.
And then, you know, are different, you can streamline that a little bit by making
that differ which is a little bit better verb than a to be verb are.
So, I streamlined that line, too. Despite methodological similarities,
classical epidemiology and clinical epidemiology differ in aim.
So, that gets to the main point of that paragraph, the main idea.
Alright I'm gonna now move on to the next part of that paragraph because there are
some interesting things here. So there's actually the author of this
article had done a good job in setting up a particular compare contrast with
parallel sentences. That is, parallel structure across
multiple sentences. And this is a really great technique.
They needed to bring it out a little bit more though.
So I just wanted to point this out to you though.
Notice the structure that's there. So they say ni classic epidemiology.
Epidemiologists, that's the group, pose a question about etiology.
In a population of people, a general population.
Okay? So we get this, in discipline one, group
one poses a question about epidemiology in a particular population.
And let me get all this, kind of, intervening stuff, which for now I'm gonna
ignore, and then we get this transition word, on the other hand we're not gonna
need that transition word if we bring out this structure nicely here, this parallel
structure. But then we get to something that's kind
of a parallel form. In clinical epidemiology clinicians,
that's the next group, pose a question about prognosis in a population of
patients. So, we get the same kind of parallel
structures. That's kind of nice, right?
They kept the language, this, the parallel in the, across those two sentences but,
you made it easy for the reader to make a nice compare contrast.
Here's exactly what's the same and here's exactly what difference, what differs.
They have the same kind of idea, but opposing questions about something
population exactly the question they're asking differs, exactly the population
differs. So I think that's really nice structure
and the author can bring it out a little bit more by doing the following, just
directly saying classical epidemiologists pose a question about the etiology of a
disease in a population of people. Clinical epidemiologist pose a question
about the prognosis of a disease in a population of patients.
So we're going to keep that structure the same across those two sentences to really
bring out the compare and contrast. Notice when I do that I don't need that
transition, on the other hand is completely unnecessary because I've got
this nice parallel structure that's making that paragraph flow.
So we get that nice compare contrast, that's telling us a lot?
Now that gets actually to the second supporting ideas of the paragraph.
What is classic epidemiology? What is clinical epidemiology?
So now all we need, need to do is the last little bit which is to define ideology or
prognosis to define those two words. And that's actually fairly easy to do.
So, I'm gonna leave the etiology bit for the end.
And I'm gonna jump right to their definition of prognosis.
Cuz this one was a little bit more, there's a little bit more going on here,
and a lot we can edit in this sentence. So it says, prognosis can be regarded as a
set of outcomes and their associated probabilities, following the occurrence of
some defining event or diagnosis that can be a symptom, sign, test result or
disease. That's quite a long sentence.
And I'll point out a few things in it. So, one thing that hopefully, by now, you,
you can pick up, is that, prognosis can be regarded as, that's a long way to, way of
saying is right? And then we get a lot of extra things
going on here. I changed this in to is the probability
that. That and then I change that to the, is a
probability that an event or a diagnosis will result in a particular outcome.
So I change quite a bit in this sentence. To try to improve the logic here as well
as get rid of some words will result in a particular outcome.
So prognosis is the probability that a particular event or diagnosis will result
in a particular outcome. I'm improving the logic here cuz we're,
we're kind of. It was in the wrong order before.
I'm making the event or diagnosis now precede the outcome, rather than the other
way around. So, we can edit that to prognosis of the
probability that an event or diagnosis will result in a particular outcome.
So we can streamline that definition quite a bit.
And then, that gets to the prognosis idea. In a minute I'll add the little definition
for ediology. I can do that pretty quickly.
So let me pull the whole thing together. So despite methodologic similarities.
Classic epidemiology and clinical epidemiology differ in name.
Classic epidemiologists pose a question about the etiology of a disease in a
population of people, and notice that I stuck in a little definition of etiology
with a semicolon there, etiologic factors can manipulated to prevent disease.
Clinical epidemiologists pose a question about the prognoses of a disease in a
population of patients, and notice that I still don't need any transition there.
And then with, again with a semicolon I stick in the diagnoses, the definition of
prognoses. Prognoses is the probability and then the
eventual diagnoses will result in a particular outcome.
So you can see we really streamlined that paragraph.
We cut out a lot a things. We used the logic and the nice parallel
sentence structure to, to get rid of the need for transition words.
And of course you wanna go, after you've edited something like this.
And just check off in your head. Or compare to the outline that you've
written on the paper. Or, or that you have in your head.
And make sure that we hit all the pieces. An indeed, we got the main idea.
We defined those two things. We showed how they differed and we, we
made the definitions of those two words. The proceeding program is copyrighted by
the Board of Trustees of the Leland Stanford Junior University.
Please visit us at med.stanford.edu.