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Why Is Medical Terminology Important In The Health Care System?
Sunday, August 9, 2009, 0:50
This news item was posted in Medical Information category and has 3 Comments so far.
I have to write a 1-2 page paper on why med terms are important and the pro and cons of them in a doctor/patient communication…
I have tried looking on the internet and I am not finding much of anything!
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3 Responses to “Why Is Medical Terminology Important In The Health Care System?”
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dougmctx said on Sunday, August 9, 2009, 2:44
Well, they’re important because when doctors are talking to other doctors or nurses or insurance companies and such, they need to have a common language that they all understand, and in general they all know the needed medical terms.
A con would be that when a doctor speaks to a patient and uses medical terms, the patient may not understand the terms used. He’s suffering from chronic halitosis! (English translation? He’s got bad breath, and has had it for a long time.)
A good doctor will use normal English terms when talking to his patients whenever possible so as to make sure his patient understands. Perhaps the doctor will teach the patient some of the relevant medical terms so the patient knows them when s/he sees them?
A pro would be that using the proper medical terms allows doctors to understand each other quickly and unambiguously. Using normal English words generally wouldn’t suffice — OK, it’s a growth, but what kind of growth? Um, a bad growth? The medical term might be `malignant tumour of pancreatic cells’, which is much more precise than just saying `a bad growth’.
When patients don’t understand their doctors, patients can die. When doctors don’t understand (or misunderstand) each other, patients can die. So both groups have to know how to talk to each other, and using the appropriate language is important.
Looking at medical terms themselves, they’re often based on Latin. (Probably not really relevant to your paper, but it might fit as trivia …)
scottsda said on Sunday, August 9, 2009, 6:10
Medical terminology tends to be much more specific than common parlance. You do not want a doctor to give you a medicine that he calls “white stuff”, nor do you want him to surgically remove a “thingy” from your body. Lack of precision leads to bad outcomes.
sirknigh said on Sunday, August 9, 2009, 11:56
look here and download the pdf its a good paper on the issues of medical terminology and communication between doctor and patienthttp://eric.ed.gov/ERICWebPortal/custom/…