Why in hospitals, is 'gun shot wound' abbreviated as "GSW"-

When

• Gun shot wound = 3 syllables, and
• GSW = 5 syllables

We abbreviate to shorten, not lengthen.

52 points · 40 comments · view on lemmy.world

40 Comments

Zorsith@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 71 pts · 219d (8 replies)

You can yell GSW across a crowded room and not cause a panic like yelling "GUN SHOT wound" might.

Rhoeri@piefed.world · -37 pts · 219d (7 replies)

I’d think that in an emergency room, it wouldn’t be that out of place to cause panic.

FriendOfDeSoto@startrek.website · 79 pts · 219d (6 replies)

Then you'd think wrong.

Rhoeri@piefed.world · -10 pts · 219d (5 replies)

So, what you’re saying is that the word “gun shot wound” would cause a panic….. in an ER.

unexposedhazard@discuss.tchncs.de · 32 pts · 219d (2 replies)

There are humans in an ER and humans are fucking stupid, so yes it could. The US is a silly place so people just instantly react to the word "gun" with thoughts of mass shootings.

prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 4 pts · 219d (1 reply)

Yeah, I wonder why we do that... Guess we'll never know

unexposedhazard@discuss.tchncs.de · 1 pts · 219d

Thats what i mean by "the US is a silly place", meaning mass shootings are daily occurrences.

jerkface@lemmy.ca · 8 pts · 219d (1 reply)

so you just gonna ignore that dumb thing you previously said and pivot to something else

Rhoeri@piefed.world · -12 pts · 219d

So you just gonna say I’m doing something I’m not doing just to have a reason to make some dumb edgy comment?

derekabutton@lemmy.world · 51 pts · 219d (2 replies)

Just pulling this out of my ass, but perhaps it's an artifact from handwritten medical charts. GSW is shorter to write.

Rhoeri@piefed.world · 7 pts · 219d

Ooh! That’s probably it! I hadn’t thought of it that way.

Omgpwnies@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 219d

it's faster typed out as well. When I worked call centres, we'd shorthand all of our notes because we had 15-30 seconds to wrap up the final notes after the call ended, not to mention no agent wants to read a novel to get up to speed.

DagwoodIII@piefed.social · 30 pts · 219d (3 replies)

Hospitals and ambulances do a lot of handwritten reports. In a conversation, the nurse/doctor/paramedic will say 'gunshot wound' but write it GSW.

Worked in public health and never heard anyone say 'GSW.'

Rhoeri@piefed.world · 7 pts · 219d (2 replies)

Could be that it’s a TV only thing. Been binging a lot of medical dramas lately.

prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone · 6 pts · 219d (1 reply)

New season of The Pitt coming out this week I think

corsicanguppy@lemmy.ca · 2 pts · 219d

Tomorrow. I'm stoked.

Apytele@sh.itjust.works · 30 pts · 219d
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rumschlumpel@feddit.org · 15 pts · 219d (1 reply)

Abbreviations aren't just used to make a word quicker to say or write, but also to obfuscate.

Gluek@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 219d

Dashing in a real rush, hurry, or else accident

blimthepixie@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 7 pts · 219d (3 replies)

Wait until you learn about abbreviating the World Wide Web 

Rhoeri@piefed.world · 3 pts · 219d (2 replies)

Is that a hospital term I’m unaware of?

ZoDoneRightNow@kbin.earth · 5 pts · 219d (1 reply)

www as in www.website.tld means "world wide web". Double-U double-U double-U uses 9 syllables when world wide web uses 3

Rhoeri@piefed.world · 1 pts · 219d

I’m aware of it.

melsaskca@lemmy.ca · 7 pts · 219d (8 replies)

It's quicker to write/type the abbreviation, so syllables don't matter. Most common example of more syllables in the abbreviation than the words themselves is "WWW" (9 syllables) for "World Wide Web" (3 syllables). Quicker to type but longer to speak.

myrrh@ttrpg.network · 3 pts · 219d (3 replies)
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CmdrShepard49@sh.itjust.works · 2 pts · 219d (1 reply)

Because we must pay homage to mister World Wide himself, Pitbull, as we browse the internet.

GamingChairModel@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 218d

Joke's on him, I'm putting my website at 305.domain.tld.

GamingChairModel@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 219d

While we're at it, I never understood why the convention for domain name wasn't left to right tld, domain, subdomain. Most significant on left is how we do almost everything else, including numbers and ISO 8601 dates.

Rhoeri@piefed.world · 2 pts · 219d

Yep. I think this his the answer. Hadn’t thought of it being abbreviated as written, then spoken as the written shorthand.

sanguinepar@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 219d (2 replies)

I saw Stephen Fry suggest once that it be pronounced "Wuh Wuh Wuh" which I kind of like :-)

corsicanguppy@lemmy.ca · 5 pts · 219d (1 reply)

Dub dub dub.

Nasan@sopuli.xyz · 2 pts · 219d

Gee ess dub dub sounds like a burger joint menu item.

GeneralEmergency@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 218d

G S Dub.

It's also shorter to write.

TigerAce@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 3 pts · 218d

Depends on the language you use. In the Netherlands W is pronounced as "wae" instead of "double you".

IWW4@lemmy.zip · 2 pts · 219d (4 replies)

I dont know why GWS is used , but there are a bunch of the medical abbreviations that are not intuitive to me.

  • PRN = As Needed
  • ASA = aspirin
  • BRP = Bathroom Priviledges (this one is intuitive)
  • PT = Bloodtest
  • bid = Twice a Day
  • BS can = Breath Sounds or Bowl Sounds
  • C with a “-“ on top of it means “with”
  • M = so many things.
ZoDoneRightNow@kbin.earth · 13 pts · 219d
  • PRN is an abbreviation of a Latin phrase "pro re nata".
  • ASA is acetylsalicylic acid which is the chemical name for aspirin
  • PT is a specific type of blood test that measures how long it takes for blood to clot called "prothrombin time"
  • BID comes from another Latin phrase "bis in die". TID is 3 times and QID is 4 times a day
  • BS can also mean blood sugar
  • c̅ is basically equivelant to w/ meaning with but it comes from the Latin "cum"
weariedfae@sh.itjust.works · 5 pts · 219d (2 replies)

I thought pt meant patient?

Apytele@sh.itjust.works · 3 pts · 218d
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IWW4@lemmy.zip · 1 pts · 219d

Probably does

middleagerioter@lemmy.world · 0 pts · 218d (1 reply)

Is this a stupid ai question?

Rhoeri@piefed.world · 2 pts · 218d

My best guess is…. no, but you probably could have made it sound more human had you not bothered to ask to begin with.

slazer2au@lemmy.world · -1 pts · 219d (1 reply)

How are you pronouncing those words? I get 6 and 3 syllables respectively.

Rhoeri@piefed.world · 9 pts · 219d

Gun ¹ Shot ¹ Wound ¹ = 3

G ¹ S ¹ W ³ = 5

The letter “w” is three syllables.

Double ² and U ¹