Today I was reminded of something fun. As a medical student I was totally fascinated by the #parathyroid glands and calcium metabolism, probably because it hadn't been included in secondary form biology. (1/n)

This was roughly the same time when it was possible to start websites for free at a Dutch organisation called De Digitale Stad (The Digital City, previously Hacktic). We had just got an internet connection, and a friend had just shown me the basics of HTML. (2/n)

So... my website was born. It had some inane rants about stuff, and a dedicated page entirely about the parathyroid glands and their role in calcium metabolism. It was based mostly on my university textbooks and I drew the illustrations myself (bitmap, nothing fancy). (3/n)

The page probably didn't get a lot of views, and the site was removed a few years later. I did get a taste for internet-based free knowledge. This was information I enjoyed writing and was happy to share. (4/n)

In retrospect, and I only really considered this today, it is not a surprise that when I discovered #Wikipedia in 2004 it was simply a continuation of the same kind of enthusiasm. At that time, the medical content (clinical and biomedical sciences) was very rudimentary. (5/n)

This was during a period when I had just passed the first part of my @MRCPUK exams but was looking for clinical work in the UK. I did therefore have some time on my hands, a brain bursting with exam knowledge, and a Wikipedia that had a medical content vacuum. Bang. (6/n)

It didn't take long before I got to know some other medics and medical students who were also contributing. An American paediatrician, a gastroenterologist from Chicago, etc. We formed a little gang that became @WikiProjectMed, although most of the originals are long gone. (7/n)

I was a very heavy contributor to Wikipedia for almost a decade, until real life responsibilities made it harder to put in long editing sessions. Some articles I wrote were immensely useful in expanding my own knowledge base (as I had to provide good sources for everything) (8/n)

There is little doubt that this work made me a better doctor than I otherwise would have been, and I can even think of a few patients who may have benefited directly from stuff I had added to Wikipedia.

It once came up in a job interview. No idea if it tipped the balance. (9/n)

Wikipedia measures the number of page views, and some stuff I have written has been read (or at least seen) by many thousands of people. I hope they found it useful.

Particular sources of pride are the articles on neurological emergencies (e.g. meningitis). (10/n)

In 2010 I cared for a fellow with the unusual condition thyrotoxic periodic paralysis (TPP). To my dismay it did not have a Wikipedia article. Now it does. Only seen one single other case since then, because this is not common in the UK. (11/n)

Free knowledge remains an ideal I am happy to support. @jimmy_wales has long used an unofficial motto for the @Wikimedia projects: "We make the internet not suck." He has a real point. (12/end)