Doctor-ese: The Secret Language of Physicians

 Doctor-ese: The Secret Language of Physicians

Doctors learn a lingo of their own to communicate with other health care providers.  Here are the secret terms doctors and nurses use when not around patients:

Blame storming: When everyone pins blame on someone else after a medical disaster.

Bloodsuckers/Leeches/Vampires: Phlebotomists

Bonehead:  Orthopedic

Brain fry:  ECT

Bug Juice:  Antibiotics

Bun in the oven: Pregnant

Bunny Boiler: Psychiatrically unbalanced woman, based on the "mistress" in the movie “Fatal Attraction.”

Crock:  A patient who fakes symptoms for secondary gain.

Crump:  To go down the tubes medically.

Chandelier sign: Any test or probing that hurts the patient so much the doctor has to pull him or her off the chandelier.

D&D:  Divorced and desperate—a divorced woman who trumps up symptoms just to come flirt with an attractive, unmarried doctor.

DBI:  Dirt bag Index. Calculated by multiplying the number of tattoos a patient has by the number of missing teeth.

Dr. Feelgood:  A doctor who indiscriminately prescribes pain pills or nerve pills.

DSTO:  Dog smarter than owner. (A favorite of veterinarians!)

Fascinoma: A fascinating case.

The Fruit salad: The Psychiatric ward

Gobbler sign:  Turkeys who show up in the ER for stupid reasons.

Gorked out: Lying in the bed unresponsive, due to medications or medical condition.

Granny dump:  Elderly mothers/grandmothers dumped in the hospital with trumped up symptoms on Friday night so the caregivers can get away for the weekend.

Incarceritis:  A dubious illness trumped up by those incarcerated to get out of prison.

Janitor’s fracture:  A bone so obviously fractured even the janitor could diagnose it.

Laying the Crepe:  Notifying a family that a loved one is in dire shape so they won’t be shocked when the patient finally dies.

Lipstick sign:  When a woman in the hospital is well enough to apply lipstick, she is well enough to be discharged.

MGM sign: Theatrics put on by a patient to get attention or pain meds.

Michelin’s sign: The multiple rolls of belly fat on an obese patient.

Microdeckia: Stupid patient operating with “half a deck.”

M&Ms: Morbidity and Mortality conference where interns are interrogated and scolded for any potential mistake they made that could have sped up a patient’s death or led to complications.

Moo Moo Movers: The blue sheets which nurses use to transfer obese patients.

Navel Gazers: Insulting name for internists used by surgeons.

Neurofecal Syndrome:  A patient who has sh%$ for brains.

OFIGATOOS:  One foot in grave and the other one slipping.

Pillow therapy:  Threats to smother an annoying or whiny patient with a pillow, thereby putting both the patient and doctor out of misery.

Pneumocephalic:  An airhead.

Quackopractor: Insulting name for a chiropractor used by doctors.

Rectospectoscope: Looking back at a botched medical case with hindsight.

Scumdex:  One point for every tattoo, extra piercing, and missing tooth.

Shotgunning: Trying everything to treat a patient when you don’t know what’s wrong with him or how to fix him; can also include ordering every test conceivable in hopes of coming up with a diagnosis by sheer luck.

Butchers/Slashers: Insulting name for surgeons used by internists.

Stream team:  Urologists

Train Wreck:  A patient so sick he’ll keep the admitting intern up all night; patients so sick they don't have a heathy organ in their entire body.

Parentectomy:  Term used by pediatricians when they kick the hovering, coddling parents of shrieking children out of the room.

The Vegetable Garden: The Neurointensive care unit where patients lay comatose like vegetables.