Why Mnemonics? Why DO Paramedics Even Need to Know This?

[Guest guest]

Re: Do paramedics REALLY need to know this stuff? How would not knowing it

affect patient care?

Would somebody come up with a defense of having paramedics know the cranial

nerves? Maybe we're wasting our time trying to teach them, those of us who

do.

I know one thing: there's sure some people out there who've got their shorts

in a wad over the mnemonics that have been posted for remembering the 12 CNs.

Unless you're a member of the EMED-L list you probably don't know what I'm

talking about.

A number of prominent emergency physicians have posted quite ribald mnemonics

as a result of my request that they do so. Seems they learned them in

medical schools. (Those hotbeds of political incorrectness and heathen

education).

Now, they and I are being taken to task for: (1) being politically

incorrect, (2) insensitive to female sensitivities (even though some who

posted were (GASP!) female physicians and nurses, (3) juvenile, (4),

downright nasty and (5) the worst of all, having a sense of humor about

SERIOUS stuff. Our tormentors apparently never read Chaucer. Of if they

did, they demanded that the school board ban him.

Well, here's a clean one I just made up: Only Organic Oysters Taste

Tantalizing And Fishily Verdant, Growing Vagarious, Silent, Hypomorphic.

This one is clean, environmentally neutral, FUN, and should easily be

remembered by all students. It is also INSIPID. That ought to get em!!!

Gene Gandy, JD, LP

Politically Incorrect