Learning Medical Language

Course Notes

Students are supplied with a textbook for ongoing reference. In addition to quizzes, and tests, there is a final course exam. Students must achieve an overall mark of 75% to successfully complete the course.

Course Breakdown

This course is comprised of a variety of topics, concepts, and projects that focus on the following areas of skill and competency:

Basic Word Structure:

Word analysis and identifying combining forms, suffixes, and prefixes

Terms Pertaining to the Body as a Whole:

Identifying the structural organization of the body, body cavities, body regions and quadrants, divisions of the spinal column, planes of the body, and positional and directional terms

Suffixes:

Understanding combining forms, suffixes, terminology, and appendices

Prefixes:

Understanding combining forms, prefixes, terminology, and appendices

Pharmacology:

Identifying drug names, standards and references, administration of drugs, terminology of drug action, classes of drugs and drug toxicity, vocabulary and combining forms, terminology, and abbreviations used in prescriptions.

Female Reproductive System:

Identifying organs of the female reproductive system, menstruation and pregnancy, terminology, combining forms, suffixes and prefixes, vocabulary, pathological conditions of the breasts, gynecological pathology, laboratory tests, and clinical procedures

Digestive System:

Identifying anatomy and physiology, vocabulary, terminology, pathological conditions, and the main organs of the digestive system

Urinary System:

Identifying the anatomy of the major organs, the production of urine by the kidneys, terminology, structures, substances, pathological conditions of the kidneys and bladder, laboratory tests, and clinical procedures

Remaining Body Systems:

Identifying the anatomy and physiology of the spinal cord, lungs, blood, lymph nodes, skin, eyes, ears, and glands

Musculoskeletal System:

Bones: formation, structure, vocabulary, combining forms and suffixes, pathological conditions, and fractures. Joints: types, bursae, combining forms and suffixes, and pathological conditions. Muscles: types, actions of skeletal muscles, vocabulary, combining forms and suffixes, pathological conditions, laboratory tests, and clinical procedures

Male Reproductive System:

Identifying the anatomy, vocabulary, terminology, combining forms, prefixes and suffixes, sexually transmitted infections and pathological conditions, laboratory tests, and clinical procedures

Cardiovascular System:

Identifying the anatomy and physiology of the heart, circulation of the blood, blood vessels, blood pressure, vocabulary, terminology, pathological conditions of the heart and blood vessels, laboratory tests, and clinical procedures