Doctor cuts to the truth about hospital slang

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This article was published 26/1/2015 (2455 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Opinion

DOC SHOCK: Dr. Brian Goldman, Toronto ER doctor and author of Night Shift and The Secret Language of Doctors, will reveal shocking slang used by hospital staff and why docs and nurses talk that way, when he appears at the Rady JCC speaker series Sunday at 7 p.m., tickets $7.

The host of the CBC radio show White Coat, Black Art is certainly not afraid of fellow physicians. In his recently released book, readers learn hospital slang like "yellow submarine" for a 400-pound patient with cirrhosis of the liver, incarceritis (jailbird faking an illness) -- and what's a horrendoma? Don't ask!

In an interview with the Mount Sinai Hospital doctor, Goldman says he talked to hospital staff to get all the slang terms and nicknames. "Some doctors appreciated it, saying, 'Yes that's us and that's our conversation,' but others say, 'Goldman, you gave away too many trade secrets this time!' "

Goldman ended up becoming a part-time writer and media host/part-time ER physician in a strange way: The insomniac overslept on the day he was supposed to give a lecture to impress people who could let him into a neurology specialty.

"They would have let me make it up, but I saw it as a message from a guardian angel," he says.

He looked into other possibilities, began to take writing more seriously and started moonlighting in the ER department, which he really liked.

"It's good for a guy with a short attention span. It was part time, exciting and stimulating."

Goldman says it isn't that doctors have negative attitudes toward patients, it's the challenges they face -- "moral distress, burnout, fatigue."

He is well-acquainted with our fair city, as he is married to Winnipeg-born Tamara Broder, an employment counsellor who lives with him and his two children, Kaille, 16, and Alexander, 13 in Toronto.

 

FLO FLYING HIGH: Manitoba recording star Flo -- who doesn't use her last name, Oramasionwu, when performing -- blew the roof off Mona Lisa Ristorante with four sets on Thursday night, joined by Mike Rizutto on guitar and Mark Debrincat on drums. Psst! Randy Bachman has taken up Flo's cause -- to get her the stardom she deserves -- and is connecting her with people who can get a British tour going.

 

HILLARY CLINTON: Not many speakers get a standing ovation just for showing up, but Hillary Clinton did. And not many serious business people take 21/2 hour lunches, but 2,000 went to the RBC Convention Centre Jan. 21 to hear the former U.S. secretary of state and first lady.

Not many potential candidates for the American presidency get asked about their grandkids -- in this case, Chelsea Clinton Mezvinsky's baby, Charlotte, but Hillary was glad to chat about her. She did skirt the question of what Charlotte will call her -- saying she'll "only veto a name" she can't abide.

Free Press editor Paul Samyn introduced Clinton. Former MLA Maureen Hemphill listened raptly, as did as the Filipino Journal's Ron Cantiveros; Forks CEO Paul Jordan; Doug Stephen of Wow Hospitality; philanthropist Gail Asper; Chuck Davidson of the Manitoba Chambers of Commerce; Colin Ryan of Nesbitt Burns; David Barnard, president of the University of Manitoba; Free Press publisher Bob Cox; and associate editor Julie Carl.

 

FUTURE LEADERS: The Future Leaders of Manitoba council attracted more than 500 business types to the Fort Garry Place ballroom on Jan. 22 for their seventh annual awards night, which honoured the province's young movers and shakers.

"It reaffirms my feeling that the future of Manitoba is in very good hands," says Jordan Farber, vice-president of council.

The 2015 winners were: Maggie Henderson, music teacher at Machray and Champlain elementary schools and music co-ordinator for the Spence Neighbourhood Association; Alexis Martin, a business analyst with Deloitte and a youth outreach worker with Voices: Manitoba Youth in Care Network; and twins Cindy Sanchez and Christa Slatnik, nurses who were co-chairwomen of the Ovarian Cancer Walk of Hope.

Finalists included Chloe Chafe of Synonym Art Consultation; Christie McLeod of the Mondetta Charity Foundation; Stephanie Caligiuri, a PhD student with the U of M's department of physiology and pathophysiology; Vinay Iyer of the Casa Burrito restaurant; Angie Bruce of Bruce & Boivin Consulting Inc. and AMR Planning & Consulting; and Jordan Miller, of Cre8ery.

Spotted: Lt.-Gov. Philip Lee; Kevin Chief, Manitoba's minister of jobs and the economy; Mayor Brian Bowman; Don Leitch of the Business Council of Manitoba; MC and business owner/former football star Obby Khan; Mariette Mulaire, president and CEO of World Trade Centre Winnipeg; and Dave Angus of the Winnipeg Chamber of Commerce.

 

SIR JOHN A. MACDONALD: Nothing stuffy about the Manitoba Historical Society's Macdonald dinner on Jan. 17, with a big crowd out to hear author and political commentator Richard Gwyn at the Fort Garry Hotel. Gwyn has written two books that cover most of Macdonald's life and political career -- The Man Who Made Us and Nation Maker.

Spotted: MC Jim Ingebrigtsen; Lt.-Gov. Lee and his wife, Anita Lee; Liberal MLA Jon Gerrard; Conservative MP Stephen Fletcher; lawyer Gary Brickman; former historical society president David McDowell; and Shirlee Smith and Judith Hudson-Beattie, former keepers of the Hudson Bay Co. archives.

Got tips, events, unique things happening? Call the tip line at 204-474-1116 or email mscurf@shaw.ca or send letters to Maureen Scurfield c/o the Winnipeg Free Press, 1355 Mountain Ave., Winnipeg, MB, R2X 3B6.