On a recent trans-Atlantic flight, my seven-year-old told me he was getting jet lag which he explained as “when your legs fall asleep from sitting too long on a plane.” He often has humorous interpretations of phrases and words, and often makes up his own like “air address” for phone number. As he learns and ins and outs of the English language, I find I am learning how to speak the language of medicine.
Only a couple years ago (maybe even just a couple months ago) I was laughing with my pharmacy school classmates at how terribly we pronounced drug names that now roll off my tongue, like ipilimumab, rivaroxaban, and levetiracetam. I still butcher quite a few names, and I am certainly not fluent in medicalese yet, but I can make my way through a medical chart (and really, ALL the words sound perfect in my head). Often I have look up terms and abbreviations and sometimes ask for further clarification – just as I would trying to speak a foreign language.
The aforementioned trans-Atlantic flight brought us to wonderful Denmark where nearly everyone speaks English and effortlessly switch between it and their native Danish. I know enough Danish – and look Scandinavian – to pull off ordering order a cup of coffee without giving away my American identity; but I sheepishly had to ask for “English please” if the response to my order was anything beyond whether or not I wanted milk in my coffee. In the health care field, we all speak medicalese (to varying degrees of success) but our first language is that which our patients speak. It can be challenging to switch between the two, but I have seen many providers do so beautifully. The attending physician I rounded with last week spoke with her residents and students in one language and then impressively switched languages to that of the patient’s understanding. I keep up my patient-focused language by practicing on my children (it is challenging explaining how kidneys work to an elementary school crowd) and, just as my son will advance his command of proper English in the upcoming school year, I will progress my medicalese fluency through immersion, aka APPE rotations. Unlike him, however, I will refrain from making up my own phrases and definitions.