• DOI:10.1136/BMJ.39049.680683.94
• Corpus ID: 5183053

I've got a little list

@article{Koplan2007IveGA,
  title={I've got a little list},
  author={Jeffrey P. Koplan},
  journal={BMJ : British Medical Journal},
  year={2007},
  volume={334},
  pages={s20 - s20}
}

• J. Koplan
• Published 4 January 2007
• Economics
• BMJ : British Medical Journal

We all enjoy top 10 lists or other numerical variants, be they selections of riverside pubs, classic rock guitarists or neurosurgeons, the world's best beaches, or the Mann-Booker shortlist. Such lists allow us to focus our own views and congratulate ourselves for our good taste or astute judgment: “The list seems valid, as they chose Mark Knopfler, Jeff Beck, and Eddie Van Halen.” They also permit us to scoff at the ignorance or lack of taste of the compilers: “Where are Joe Perry, Dickie Betts, and Stephen Stills?” But I digress.

Rarely do these lists have the explicit quantitative criteria that would satisfy a Cochrane collaborator. But the fun—and frustration—is in the subjectivity of the choices. If readers find themselves in agreement with over half the list then some modicum of satisfaction is achieved. Thus all BMJ readers will have turned, with a sense of anticipation mixed with scepticism, to the list in this supplement of the top 15 (egregious inflation of the more decimally traditional 10 or the more familiar dozen) medical milestones of the past 166 years. The list was developed by …