Sunday, January 13, 2008
Klass Article
After reading the Klass article I found it to be true. Anytime you go to see the doctor or you have to go to the hospital, it seems that the doctors are talking in a different to each other. I've been in te hopsital a few times having ro stay over night ateast 3 diferent times and when the doctor would come in and check up on me, they would talk to each other using expressions instead of talking in a way that I could understand. I also agree with Klass in the fact that doctos use baseball terms. I've seen it on television shows when they talk about throwing a perfect game which means you didn't lose any patients that day/night. I also think that using this type of language when around the patient can be positive and negative. I think it is negative in the fact that it doesn't help the patient understand what is wrong and can frustrate them. On the other, hand if doctors do not use the medical language in certain situations, the patient could become worked up over nothing. For example, if doctors want to run some check-ups on some illnesses just as a precaution and they tell the patient but he misinterprets it as something more serious, then that gets the patient worked up over nothing.
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4 comments:
Two years back I went in for x-rays on my right foot after football with some friends. I felt a bit silly hobbling off the field since it was flag football, but I could barely walk. The doctor who explained the x-rays gave me about 20 seconds of his attention in order to tell me I had a phalangeal fracture of the second metatarsal. I apparently had wasted enough of his time as he stormed out of the room. I had to wait another twenty minutes for a nurse to tell me what I had done to my foot after the doctor told me what I had done to my foot.
I agree with you completely. The article did a good job of talking about how the medical profession used jargon as a form of communication. I know when I have been in a hospital before they all would have their terms that patients aren't supposed to understand. I think it's frustrating as a patient but it's part of the hospital experience I guess!
Something like this also happened to me. A few years ago I was at cheerleading practice and I would get these terrible hives all over my legs, arms and neck in the exposed areas (because I wore shorts and a t-shirt). This reaction happened very often, but it was most prevalent at practice. I went to several different doctors, but we could not figure out what was wrong with me because we still did not know what was triggering the reaction. I went to at least 3 doctors that basically said I was lying because I didn't have the hives at the doctors office. I ended up finding out that I am allergic to cold temperatures. The reason I had a reaction at the gym was because my skin was hot and the fans in the room were blowing cold air. These doctors made me feel very ridiculous when the doctors played off my sickness as a joke and wouldn't take my symptoms seriously. Sometimes it felt like because they knew they were smarter than me and my mother, they could get rid of us easily by sending us to another doctor with no results and not take the time to find out that it was just a simple rare allergy. If this was not the case then they weren't communicating properly or sending the right message.
Your group is doing very nice job! Thanks!
Ruijie
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