"The Jingle Bell Bum" (Read The Touching True Story...please!) Comment at patriciahanrion.com

"The Jingle Bell Bum" (Read The Touching True Story...please!) Comment at patriciahanrion.com
Still available on Amazon for Nook and Kindle, hard copy booklett to re-print November 2013

Thursday, February 23, 2012

" HUH! What did you say #2"

This is a re-do because the 2012 class in pharmacology had some amazing answers to the abbreviation quiz that not only made me laugh they also would have gotten very good grades...IF this was a creative writing class...not pharmacology...See the new entries to this post below:

Today was the first exam for my Pharmacology class.  I graded the exams and began to think about all the things we can no longer do or say in class...teachers and students.  When I taught a second grade after school drama class, I clearly remember hugging and wiping tears from one young thespian who could not remember her lines...today...that hug could be beyond the boundaries set, by the child, her parents, or the school district.

It's a shame the way we are restricted and I must admit I sometimes go beyond the invisible line in the sand.
I find it hard to talk about the creation of another person, when I teach Maternal-Child Health and not sometimes mention...OH No...God, Heavenly Father, Jehovah...the big guy in the sky.  Now I'm not preaching or giving a sermon but my goodness it is hard to look upon a new born baby that was created in nine months from the DNA of two different people and not think it's a miracle beyond our understanding.  And that a greater being than a mere human had a lot to do with it.

From time to time I have a student ask ,"What do you think about abortion or pregnancy termination."  I remind them of the timeline of physical and neuro-conscious development and ask when they consider a life begins?  It is quite clear when I make that statement what I believe without putting it into words (which could come back and bite me).  But I let them figure out the answer for themselves, knowing that today the climate is very different from when I was in school.  Over 40 years ago when I first worked in Labor and Delivery, one of the things we were allowed to do as nurses was declare our feelings on the issue of pregnancy termination and we were not required to participate in the procedure.  Fancy that one happening today.

All this leads me to some interesting and very 21'st century answers on the medical abbreviation quiz.  We list medical abbreviations such as PRN (whenever necessary) or TPR (temperature, pulse, respiration) and expect the student to fill in the blank with the appropriate meaning of the abbreviation.

Since nursing and medicine in general has it's own language, knowing these abbreviated terms is a critical part of a student's knowledge and an important part of communication between professionals.

Some of the answers were very creative and others gave me insight as to how much the world has changed.


               Medical Meaning                         Student Answer
ADL      activities of daily living          active dance life
           (watching dancing with the stars last night?)
ac          before meals                        electric plug
           (electrition husband?)
bid         twice a day                   what you do at an auction
           (watches antique roadshow?)
CHF      congestive heart failure      crummy reaction found
      (I think I'm having a crummy reaction to these answers)
Derm     Dermatological                    like a germ only nicer
          (what were you thinking?)
DNR     do not resuscitate                 Do Not Run!
          (good if you work at the pool)
HA         headache                   hard ass, holding account
          (has a nasty boss...see previous blog entry of 2/22)
HDL      High Density Lipoprotein      honey do list           
          (must have been one of the male students)
INR     International Normalized ratio      ingestion required
          (not bad try)
ER          Extended Release               Erection returning
          (used the little blue pill recently)
GTT       Glucose tolerance test       Gut toughness test
          (another creative try)
MED     minimal effective dose   medical emergency Do over
          (AND don't tell anyone this happened)
NPO     Nothing by mouth                Not pleasant odor
          (code brown)
optha   ophthalmic      opthamolicalology, orthomydiacal,   
           (if I use enough letters maybe I will be right)               
 SR        sustained release               sometimes rancid
           (the NPO was SR?)
SubQ   sub cutaneous                     sub-courteously
           (is this a spelling error?)
SL        sub lingual                         standing lateral
           (Or sitting posterior?)
OT       occupational therapy         over there
           (over there...where?)
SOB      shortness of breath           someone obnoxious
           (Watch out! SOB-OT)
LR        Lactated Ringers               lactating regularly
           (can male patients do this?)
RTU     ready to use                      regular time uncertain,
                                                    religious talk underway
            (Oh my! is this test over yet?)
PVC  premature ventricular contraction      plastic pipe
            (husband is a plumber?)
Tx        treatment                       Texas
            (How long ago did you move to Calif?)
Tab      tablet                         totally awsome babe,
                                                   taboo
              (Ot is a Tab who is LR....try that one)
pc         after meals                    politically correct
            (Really?)

HUH, what did you say?

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