The Bossier banner. [volume] (Bellevue, Bossier Parish, La.) 1859-1952, 1882-10-12
Medical Technical Terms.


Medical Technical Terms.
There are some people uncharitable
enough to think that medical practice
would be much less productive to its
professors if they would break down the
barrier of Greek and Latin nomenca-
ture, which is the principal element in
its mystery. Whether such is, or is not,
the fact there can be no doubt that med
zeal knowledge is becoming more gen
eral, and that the employment of classic
technical names is in process of gradual
abandonment. This fact may be amply
proved by a glance at reports of Boards
of Health, and even by medical jour
mails, which have chosen to adopt popu-
lar, not to say vulgar, nomenclature in
technical reports. There is enough Of
technical naming left, however, to make
aridale of their tables and dispositions
to one not familiar with the parent lam
guage. This is the case even when the
effort is to populalize knowledge and in
formation. Take, for instance, the PEI
riodical reports of the Board of Health
OF this city. one of whose functions is
supposed to be the COLLATION. of informa-
ton on health matters for the instruction
OF citizens. Their sources of Informal
ton are chiefly practicing physicians,
and If they adopted the peculiar orthog-
raphy Of some of the practitioners, as
seen in their reports, they could hardly
be less understood. What mother would
recognize under the term 'aphthn'i
those disagreeable little curd-like sores
on her baby's mouth, which she always
| a,-I na1l -, 4
the aged darkey, who finds himself
powerful weak to know that he is
really afflicted with "asthenia. u The
''misery in the chest" of old-time suffer-
ers is known to experts as angina pee
toris. When muscles waste away
without traceable disease they are said
to be ''atrophied." The, to spectators,
painful affection, asst. Vitus Dance" is
'chorea'' in medical parlance. Rest
disturbing, soul-harrowing carbuncles
would hardly be recognized under the
name anthrax Ff
Many of the technical names are made
by adding the suilix '.itis'' to the classic
names of the organ affected. Thus in
formation of the brain substance be-
| comes s'cerebritis'' of the stomach and
| bowels is ''gastro entcritis," of tho
| bowels alone senteritis." The common
and recognizable affection, dropsy, il
/ ''acites, !" with changes in name accord.
ing to the location. Thus, dropsy of tho
brain is ''hydrQ-cephalus," of the chest
'thydro-thoray, OF the ear ''hydrotitis,''
| of the flesh ''anasarca, or of the Joints
''hydrosteon." Heart disease generally
is described as "carditis." Blood vom-
:
janders," which were more common
when the prairies of Illinois were first
broken, and is by no means uncommon
now, would hardly be recognized as
''melcena cholea," ''icterus,n and SIC
terus veri dis according to the type
and virulence of the complaint. 'sLeu-
cocythemia" is a very long name to de-
scribe the milky condition of blood Incl
dent to insufficient nutrition. ..Maras-
mus is another way of saying clean
ness" although it means something
more, lean condition that comes of
lack of power to assimilate no,lrishment.i
''Udema'' is the word doctors use to-
describe general dropsical condition.
Scrofula was once a technical term, butt
has become common through long use. 1
Not so ''choreas," which means the same |
thing. The latter, by the way, is the /
Greek for swine, that animal be- /
ing credited by the ancients with
incubating and spreading the dis
ease. ''Scleroderman is a fine, mouth
filling word, meaning 1s'scallyn applied
to the skin. 1t probably would not help
the seamstress to bear her backache to
know she suffered with 'smyeletis," nor
do 70 \
'cephalagia. '.Synoirtis" is inAam-
nation of the joints; ''tetanus' lock-iaw; /
"uismus nascentium," a sort of lock- |
jaw which aifiicts very young babies.
''Iabes dersalis'' is better known under |
its old-fashioned name. "the ripples"
Many of the technical words, however,
are OF real assistance to practitioners,
because they indicate diseases, condi- |
tons, or parts of the human anatomy |
that would require several English words |
to describe. Thus 'peritonis' is inflam-
nation OF a membrane that envelopes all |
the inferior viscera. ''Menengitis'' an in |
Illumination of the covering membrane of |
the brain and spinal marrow
A good deal is to be said in favor of |
technical nomenclature in pharmacy. Ii
is not desirable to have the prescriptions
OF physicians compounded by people
whose knowledge of English is limited, |
and OF other tongues zero The classic |
words and phrases become a safeguard,
as instruction in the art of |
medicine making must be preceded by
course OF instruction in letters QUALIFYING
the pupil to read and comprehend the
technical terms. Besides, it is not al
ways desirable to have a patient know
what medicine he is using. 1t is en-
phatieally true of medical science that "a
1tao learning is q dangerous tning."-