Okay so I thought it might be really fun if...
You've seen my videos, right?
Yeah yeah You know I have costumes? Yes!
Let's imagine you come to London and
then you have a pain or some problem that you really need a doctor for
What do you do? How do you describe things?
What might your doctor say and how do you understand everything?
and like that, we're in your doctor's surgery!
studio magic! this is my doctor surgery, but it's very similar to the set we were chatting on
It's so similar but it's not!
So one thing I love that you do on your channel is that you'll watch an
episode of house and you kind of try and diagnose the patient but you explain it
in such an easy way. I thought maybe we could practice something like that
I'll have a symptom and maybe you can diagnose me? Sure, let's do it!
In this scenario as well if you are struggling with English we always
have options to get interpreters as well you know in hospital we can often get
another member of staff who can sit in who may be able to speak the language or
we can get people on the phone so that's always an option we can use
So that's an option then? Absolutely!
You could have an interpreter? Exactly!
Perfect. But! You should try! Why not?
So first of all whenever we talk to a
patient the first thing we want to explore is ask you about what's brought you in so
Tell me about what's been going on. Tell me about what's brought you in today.
Okay well for two days I've been having cramps
so notice grammatically I said I've been having cramps
I used present perfect because it's from a past time until now I've been having
cramps okay so with all symptoms something that a medical thing that's
going on that's what we call a symptom with the doctor we want to explore that
symptom in more detail okay so with this particular one and ask you where do you
have the pain and it feels like it's in the bottom of my stomach in the lower
part of my stomach okay so the stomach we actually think of being quite high up
but actually people think the stomach means the whole of the abdomen whole of
the tummy as well but we can use it interchangeably so that's why it's
important for us it doesn't matter if you use these language terms we have to
identify that and find out so I might say can you show me where you're having
the pain so you could get me to point out I told you I was stupid
so but no that's really interesting so in English we say my stomach or my belly
just this whole area is my stomach or my belly mm-hmm right okay cool so so I
know where the pain is now right and I'm a and you've given me a bit of a hint
that's been going on for two days so with this I'd want to know what I'd call
the Fido so I want to know its frequency so I'd ask you how often do you have to
paint it's about every every hour and it lasts about 10 minutes okay good so
within that as well you've also given me the duration so that's the D and Fido so
you give me the frequency so how often you get it and you've given me the
duration so when you get it how long it lasts for so the eye is for the
intensity so I'd like you to give me a score like how at worst how bad is the
pain okay so in general it's about a 5 but last night it was so bad that I
fainted too faint means you lose consciousness you fall over or another
phrasal verb to pass out so I could say last night the pain was so bad I passed
out ok so I want to explore those symptoms of what led you to pass out but
we'll leave that for the moment so the O stands for the onset so tell me about
what happened when it first came on okay so for about a week it's been hurting a
little bit but progressively over time it's it has been getting worse okay fine
so with this particular symptom I'd want to ask a few more questions we actually
use a slightly different framework but this isn't a medical thing we'd normally
use Socrates so a few more mnemonics to explore but one of the things in
Socrates is does the pain radiates anywhere so radiate means does it move
from one place to another so you said the pains here so does the pain go
anywhere else and yes it's moved to the side now okay fine and have you had any
changes in your urine or any changes opening your bowels
nope they are beautiful very good so we will kind of end that
particular roleplay thing there right because we kind of I'd worry about
something like an appendicitis so you're a young person with abdominal pain that
started centrally and is now radiated to the side now and that's what we'd worry
about in that circumstance and you'd also have other symptoms so feel
generally unwell fevers but because the pain made you pass out you know that's
the type of thing we'd be looking at okay what happens next like what
questions would I expect yeah so then I'd want to know about any medical
conditions you have so your past medical history how does that question go
so I'd say anything that you see your doctor regular belt or any medical
conditions you have will say no cool and then I'd ask any previous operations
you've had okay and I had my tonsils removed a few years ago is that relevant
it is relevant because although it may not be relevant to this body system we
know that you may have had certain medications certain anesthetic drugs
that we know you're probably comfortable having again okay so then after we've
done the kind of looked at your past medical history and past surgical
history I talked about any medications that you're on so I'd ask you any drugs
that you take regularly so this is an interesting thing so you said drugs now
if your doctor asks you about your what drugs you take probably you don't mean
heroin that would still be important to tell your doctor but when we talk about
drugs we're not talking about illicit drugs so drugs you smoke or drugs you
inject we're talking about medications you take okay treat medical conditions
right so do I take medication we don't say I eat a pill or I eat medicine we'd
say I take the medicine or if it's maybe long-term I could say I'm on the
medicine name so I don't know last month I was on antibiotics for an infection
fine and then within the when I'm exploring your medications I'd want to
know about any allergies any drug allergies okay perfect now if I have an
allergy I use this structure I'm allergic to name of thing so this is
true I'm allergic to penicillin okay I've just told everyone how to kill
me that's all right
we won't be giving you that you should be given in that you could also say I
have an allergy to penicillin or I have a penicillin allergy so the last thing
we talked about in the history after we've done the drug history we talked
about your family history so ask you if you have any medical conditions that run
in your family nope we're pretty we're a healthy Bunch
good good good and then we'd ask about your social history so I'd basically
keep it very open so I'd say what job do you do I'm a teacher yeah and I say have
you had any foreign travel recently um I went on holiday to Italy okay
and but no we're sort of outside of that in the last few months
no cool and then I'll ask do you smoke cigarettes no have you ever smoked
cigarettes no okay and do you drink alcohol yes
so they're not ask you what you typically drink in a week um maybe I
have one or two beers a week okay so one or two pints of beers yeah okay fine so
there's about three units in a beer so I'd say you have about six units of
alcohol a week so that may be relevant but in those quantities cool okay and
the last thing we should be talking about is any concerns you have so how
are you feeling is there any particular worries you have because very often
people know it's not just they come with illness they have preconceived ideas and
worries about why they're coming to the doctor right it would always be an
opportunity so I'd say is there anything worrying units brought you in today yeah
I've probably got cancer that's always my that's always my worry if anything
hurts I'm dying I've got cans
and I'll google it you're so right google often doesn't help these things
because caps can have lots of symptoms but a doctor will be able to take a look
at the whole picture and be able to reassure you okay so I don't have cancer
with the given symptoms here it would be very low down on - okay good that's
that's put my mind ease so then after we've done our history would then do an
examination of you so in this instance with the abdominal pain we'd probably
want to take some observations so check your blood pressure check your heart
rate measure your temperature and a few other
things and also want to have a feel of your tummy or your belly as we said
earlier and then from there organize some investigations like blood tests and
possibly a scan you as a patient you might say I'm going to have a blood test
or what would you say is a doctor how would you tell me that so we can say I'm
going to take a blood test or take some of your blood or take a blood sample
it's it's very much a take action because you'll give it us something
right you're not borrowing and finally might I need surgery okay for with this
particular condition yeah we're thinking about absolutely I mean that this would
be an emergency so if you were presented to your family doctor we'd want to refer
you into the hospital for these blood tests and for the scan because we can do
that very quickly we can't do them in a GP practice straight away and then from
there you will certainly be under the surgical team to rule out the
possibility of needing surgery okay but if I do need surgery the way I can say
it is I'm going to have surgery or have an operation or have an operation seat
now you're an English teacher that's it so let's get out of your practice let's
go of your surgery yup and we're back back in the studio I asked you guys to
send me your questions about medicine in the UK and any medical questions that
you might have we'll answer them for you so let's have a look...