Decided to test a former pharm tech.
how
i guess the p and l are the important bits and the rest can just be inferred, since paracetamol is very commonly used and they’d get tired writing it in detail every time. other more specialized drugs with p___l (or close to it) as its name would have more squiggles i assume.
It’s (shorthand)[teeline.online]. It says “prc(t)ml” with the p being in the obvious spot (though it should be just a downward line), the r is the diagonal line after it, the c is the little curl, the t should be more pronounced, but it should be a horizontal line slightly above the rest, the m is a concave-down swoosh, and the l is the final curl. No vowels b/c they’re largely redundant.
I get the L, but how did you get the P? At best it’s an O, at worst it’s a D.
The rest is just cursive shit idk
Ignore the left side of the oval, then you get a lower case p with a looong stroke down and a teeny tiny )-shape.
It’s a super common prescription and most doctors probably couldn’t spell it offhand. Combined with dosing info it would be more obvious. Also if they do happen to be wrong it’s unlikely to actually cause harm with acetaminophen/paracetamol.
Edit: another benefit is disguising to a patient that demands something to take. Essentially a placebo.
In addition, there’s a psychological phenomenon where our brains only need the first and last letter of a word in the right place, and all the right letters in between in any order, to suss out a word. Our familiarity with a lngaauge will put it together, so presumably the same is true for healthcare providers’ common words.
Note: I included an example of this in my comment
Your e-----------e d-----t w----k w-----------t the c-----------t of the l---------s i-----------------n.
If they’re commonly used words the scribbles end up becoming a form of shorthand that doctors can recognize, but they’re meaningless to anyone who isn’t already familiar with them.
“Your example doesn’t work without the context of the (something) intention.”
How’d I do?
Pretty damn close.
“Your example doesn’t work without the context of the letters inbetween.”
Inbetween is not a word.
In adtidion, trehe’s a pshyocloigal pheonmneon where our bairns olny need the fsrit and lsat lteter of a word in the rghit pclae, and all the rghit ltertes in bteewen in any oedrr, to suss out a word. Our faiilamirty with a lagnuage wlil put it toehgter, so pseurambly the smae is treu for haehtlcare pvoerdirs’ cmmoon wdros.
FTFY… I read this just as fast as the original.
I love that effect, but sometimes it can fail. For example:
Our familiarity with lineage will…
Is how my stupid ass brain read it first and I knew what was up
Statistics, I think
Funny, but also not. Just Googled because I couldn’t remember:
“According to the Institute of Medicine, physician’s illegible notes lead to approximately 7,000 deaths annually.”
Seems unreal. Even if it was half that…that’s a lot of people. If I was getting prescribed drugs, I want it LEGIBLE. Typed up would be great. I just don’t trust that shit, and neither should any of you.
some said i was destined to be a doctor with my handwriting and family. i decided to break the cycle and become a videographer that barely scrapes by. my family is… they like the videos i make of our get togethers…
at least i haven’t accidentally killed anyone.
Back in the day I used to work at one of the largest hospitals in the US. In my last year there they had started having doctors record their notes, issues order, and prescriptions, on an audio file, using and issued microphone. Then that stuff was sent to a group of people transcribing everything in text. these scribes would also fill out forms for the orders and prescriptions. they did this in response to a series of lawsuits they lost badly.
No surprise. Lead is very toxic. /s
Looks kinda the same
Meanwhile, here in Sweden, when I get a perscription, my doctor types on his computer for five min, I then walk to any pharmacy, hand them my ID, of they have it they will offer a cheaper alternative, if they don’t have any of the medicine, they will tell me which pharmacy does, if none has it they will order it for me.
Oh it’s a problem here to. You do not want to know how much information is passed on through rapidly scrawled sticky notes in our healthcare system - particularly in emergency situations.
Same here in Italy, but it took COVID to get them off their asses and finish the system for this that was already 90% there
Here in Germany it was introduced last year (I think). Heard it still causes trouble on the organization side, but as a patient it works great.
It even works for animal medicine. My cat needed some and the pharmacy just ordered it!
Works for a couple of years in Poland. You give them your personal identity number and a 4 digit number you get from a doctor (or you can go to a government website and get it from your perscriptions directly) and you get your perscription. We also have websites dedicated to finding medication, available to everyone. You can even sometimes reserve it online.
Peenol™️ - it’s for the peen™️
It’s a sperm
I see it
I don’t.
Paracetamol
You don’t need prescription for paracetamol afaik, could be prescription strength I guess
Might not be a prescription, could be release forms or something like that
Or that, for sure
If it’s in a hospital setting any medication given likely needs an MD order.
Or that you want to be able to put it through insurance / benefits.
If you need more than I think it’s about 16 in a single transaction you do in the UK I think.
p-------------l
How much do MDs actually write a day? Are they saving that much time by doing that shit?
40% of the visit is typing. They need to keep history, write the perscription etc. Nowadays they do that on PCs. Though I used to have a doctor that wrote everything on a typing machine. You’d tell him what’s wrong and then he’d write it, often with tons of typos (he wouldn’t start over). Obviously meds were always correct, it was just funny seeing a doctor butchering words and being unable to correct himself.
Pre-electronic records, yes they wrote a lot. Lot’s of things were done in shorthand or with forms to reduce the writing. It’s also that a doctor’s time is valuable, saving 30 seconds on a prescription is a lot when you write 10s or hundreds per day.
Skeptical of anybody who calls it Paracetamol.
North America and Japan are the only places in the world that don’t call it that
That’s very interesting, I had no idea. Yes, Tylenol or acetaminophen.
The chemical name is para-acetoaminophenol. Acetaminophen and paracetamol are both abbreviations. Tylenol is just a brand.
What do you call it?
Tylenol, acetaminophen in the US.
It’s paracetamol everywhere else.
Whoah.
So, never heard of those. But DDG tells me Tylenol is just a brand—talk about an effective monopoly.
Advil is ibuprofen and Aleve is naproxen. They tend to get the same brand treatment as Band-Aids and Vaseline in the US.
Can you buy naproxen without a prescription over there? I thought you generally needed to pair it with something like omeprazole and the general public can’t be trusted to read instructions
Yes. It’s available over the counter. I’ve never heard of pairing it with omeprazole. What is the reason for that?
NSAIDS (type of painkiller) can cause or exacerbate stomach issues. Omeprazole is an antacid that can counter some of those issues.
Generally they just recommend taking nsaids with food, and it mostly solves the stomach problems.
We do that a lot it seems, like the South who call everything and it’s mother coke
lol they only learn the brand name what make it harder to get cheaper medication, that’s so USA
TIL paracetamol isn’t a worldwide thing. Huh.
TIL acetaminophen isn’t a worldwide thing :)
The whole Tylenol thing is because they’re the ones who originally patented it. Same for Advil and ibuprofen.
The chemical was discovered in the 19th century. Tylenol is a US thing, the common name in Europe is Panadol.
Panadol is a brand name, but I’ve never heard anyone here refer to the product by that name
What about Paracet?
