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How doctors remember

By: Article Brain Editor

How doctors remember

Thanks to catchy verses from my childhood, I can remember the order of the colors of the rainbow (since, after all, Richard of York Gained Battle In Vain). A rather smuttier string of words reminds me of the electrochemical series for metals — Potassium, Calcium, Sodium, Magnesium, Aluminum and the rest of it (although please don't ask me to tell you now what the electrochemical series is.)

And, of course, anyone who wants to remember the string of numbers of Pi, need only recall the following sentence: "How I need a drink, alcoholic of course, after the tough lectures involving quantum mechanics." (Count the letters in each word to get 3.14159265358979.)

Medical students, it turns out, use these kinds of mnemonics all the time to sear into their circuits the proper placement of the veins in the arm and the right dose of medicine to chambers of the heart or whatever-else-have-you.

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Want to know the function of certain nerves in a group called the brachial plexus? Chant the following: "C5-6-7, raise your wings up to heaven." This helps tells you that these nerves are involved in helping raise the arm past 90 degrees.

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Suspect a patient in the ER has organophosphate poisoning? Check from this list, which spells out the word DUMBBELS: Diarrhea, Urination, Miosis, Bradycardia, Bronchospasm, Emesis, Lacrimation, Salivation.

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Someone in your party choke on a hot dog? The catchy rhyme "inhale a bite, go down the right" is a handy reminder that the hot dog is far more likely to get stuck in the right bronchial tube than the left.

This and much more to be found at www.medicalmnemonics.com. Take a browse there, then impress (or infuriate) the heck out of your friends with your endless supply arcane knowledge.

— Rosie Mestel