Thursday 9 December 2010

ASD/PID

Atrial Septal defect or Austistic spectrum disorder?
Pelvic inflammatory disease or Prolapsed intervertebral disc?

Best not to get them confused

7 comments:

  1. Agreed.

    However, to be fair, PID is the standard acronym for Pelvic inflammatory disease as is ASD for atrial septal defect.

    It is unfortunate that, a core body of eejits should ruin perfectly good acronyms for the rest of us.

    ReplyDelete
  2. but I have both....an ASD and an ASD...so what am I? A double ASD?

    ReplyDelete
  3. I'm really glad you posted about this. I've had both PID(s) in the last year.

    PID is generally used for Pelvic Inflammatory Disease. For PID in the back-sense I've heared most doctors just call it a Hearniated/Ruptured disc. Or more specific, Ruptured/Hearniated L5/L4 whatever is applicable really to the patient.

    Pain in the arse though all of the acronyms.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Atrial septal defect (ASD) is a form of congenital heart defect that enables blood flow between the left and right atria via the interatrial septum

    ReplyDelete
  5. Learn something from this: always avoid acronyms. Please.

    ReplyDelete
  6. I can honestly say I have never used acronyms, they irritate me in the notes. As somebody who knows relatively little medicine its bad enough not knowing what 99% of them mean without worrying about whether they been condition A or B

    ReplyDelete
  7. Yes I think Doctors should avoid acronyms particually since (but this is not always the case) the junior doctors that float between wards particually at night time write in notes in what I can only describe has shorthand that journalists use! On top of all that I've seen note entries almost compleatly consisting of acronyms that the Nurses and day doctors spend about an age trying to de-crypt in the morning.

    However, next time you're on a ward take a gander at the Nurses handover sheet. You'll never see anything like it! I've become a bit of an expert trying to figure them out (biggest problem for a student nurse, figuring out the acronym, then the disease!) but acronyms amongst nurses are used for diseases, drugs (the worst by far) patient state, orders to be completed. It's terrible.

    ReplyDelete