*Corrected Audio File* #38- 30 Words for Emergencies and Being in the Hospital

*Sorry for the mistake! Only 12 minutes of the last episode were uploaded. This is the full episode. Thanks so much!

Welcome to episode #38 of The Real Life English with Gabby Podcast!

In this episode, you'll be learning 30 popular slang words, phrasal verbs, and idioms all about Emergencies and Being in the Hospital! Even though we hope that none of us will ever end up in the hospital either for ourselves or loved ones, it's important to be prepared for emergencies. Understanding what doctors and health care providers are saying can be a life saving skill. After listening to this episode, you’ll be able to speak about hospital emergencies with CONFIDENCE and be one step closer to speaking English like a native speaker.

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• Transcript

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Transcript

[00:00:00] On this episode of the Real Life English with Gabby podcast, I'll be teaching you 30 slang words, phrasal verbs, and idioms for being at the hospital and having emergencies. You'll be learning vocabulary like stat, touch-and-go, come to, patch up, stitch up, and more. Let's get to it.

Hey there! Welcome to the Real Life English with Gabby podcast. I'm your host, Gabby, your fun and friendly English teacher from the one and only New York City. My goal is to teach you phrasal verbs, idioms, and slang that will help you speak English confidently and understand real American conversations.

Are you ready to improve your English skills? Let's jump right in.

[00:01:00] Hey, hey, hey! Greetings from New York City. Thanks so much for tuning in to this episode. Now, let me tell you right now, this is a huge episode. Huge. Thirty new words. I typically do not like to do more than 20 words. Honestly, 15 words per episode is extremely ideal because it's not giving you too much. And 15 new words in one week? Great. But, you know, some topics I think really need to have nothing left out. I could have cut a lot of words, but this is a really important topic.

I've wanted to do this episode for a long time, and finally, it's here: emergencies and being at the hospital. This is a very important thing, very common. Most people at some point need to go to the hospital. Most people at some point will have emergencies, either with themselves, their friends, or loved ones. You know, it's a tough topic to talk about [00:02:00] because maybe, for some of you, it can bring up bad memories, and I'm very sorry. And, you know, it's something that we hope we don't need, but probably will.

Aside from that, a lot of my students tell me that they watch medical dramas, like Grey's Anatomy. Let me just take a little brief pause here to talk about Grey's Anatomy.

Okay, so Grey's Anatomy, I think, has been on for like 20 seasons. I never watched it. I figured that it was like a soap opera—a novella for some of you. And then, like, two or three months ago, I started watching it. And oh my goodness, it is a fantastic show. So now I understand why so many of you watch Grey's Anatomy. But I have to tell you also, Grey's Anatomy is a really good show to watch for your English because they don't only talk about medical stuff. They talk about life, relationships. It's a really good show [00:03:00] if you want to practice your English. So after this episode, actually, I recommend that you go and watch Grey's Anatomy. If you've never watched Grey's Anatomy, go ahead and watch Episode 1. You're going to hear a lot of these words in one episode. And if you are a lover of Grey's Anatomy, watch your favorite episode, and I'm sure you're going to hear some of these words.

So, this episode is not going to teach you expressions for when you go to the hospital, like, "I have an emergency" or "I have pain." That's for a different episode. This episode is going to explain words that you will hear at a hospital and during emergencies so that, if you are in the United States and doctors are talking to you, you can understand what they're saying. This episode will also help you talk about emergencies with other [00:04:00] people. So, if your friend is in the hospital, your family member is in the hospital, and you have to explain to other people in English what's going on, you will be able to do that.

My focus for this podcast is really intermediate and above speakers of English. So, this is not really for beginners. It's more for intermediate, high-intermediate, and advanced and proficiency students—B1 and above—who have studied English but want more. They don't just want textbook English. So, if you are a beginner, if you are A1 or A2, this episode is maybe not for you. Unless you are living in the United States and you really need it, then cool. But this episode is really for levels B2, C1, and C2 because of the level of vocabulary. So just giving you a heads-up, this is a big episode. [00:05:00] Big, big episode. I recommend you listen to this episode, take a look at the study guide, really practice, really take in this vocabulary.

Let me tell you the 30 words that you're going to learn in today's episode:

The ER, stat, wheel in, in critical condition, a stretcher, code blue, vitals, triage, bleed out, crash cart, scrub in, touch-and-go, the OR, to go/put under, patch up, stitch up, on life support, the ICU, a close call, hanging on, under observation, run some tests, pass out, come to, bloodwork, rule out, on the mend, get a clean bill of health, get back on your feet, and to make a full recovery.

[00:06:00] Before we continue, I'd just like to remind you that there's a free study guide waiting for you so that you have resources and practice materials to reinforce everything you learned in the episode. The study guides are usually between 10 and 15 pages, and they have all of the important information from every episode, including the word list, the story, the definitions and example sentences, the transcript, and practice activities.

Using these free study guides will really get you one step closer to becoming a fluent English speaker because you will put into practice everything that you heard. And the best part is you can do this whenever you have the time. You can do one section of the study guide per day, or you can sit down and do it all at once.

To get the study guide, just look at the episode description and click the link. The link will then be sent to your email, and you will have access to the folder that has all of the study guides inside. And that way, whenever there's a new episode coming out, [00:07:00] you'll know right away that the study guide is automatically added to the folder.

Also, if you love the show and you feel like I'm helping you learn English and reach your English goals, I would love to get a five-star review from you on Spotify or Apple Podcasts or on whatever streaming platform you prefer. Five-star reviews allow the podcast to get broadcast more on these platforms and shared with other students like you who could benefit.

All right, [00:08:00] so now let's get to the story.

In case it's your first time listening, or if you just need a reminder, pay attention when I read the story and listen to all of the words being used in context. Then, after I read the story, I will explain the words in the order that they appear in the story.

Let's get to it.

All right, here we go.

Late on a Friday night, the ER was busy with activity. Nurses, doctors, and paramedics moved quickly, responding to calls of "STAT" from every corner. In the middle of the chaos, two patients were wheeled in at the same time. Jason, in critical condition, had been in a serious car accident. The paramedics [00:09:00] brought him in on a stretcher, shouting, "We've got a code blue!" His vitals were unstable, and he was losing blood quickly.

The staff rushed him past triage into the ER to assess his injuries. "He's bleeding out. We need a crash cart, and get a surgeon to scrub in immediately," the doctor ordered.

Jason's condition was touch and go as they wheeled him into the O.R. They quickly put him under, and the surgical team started working tirelessly to patch up his internal injuries and stitch up multiple wounds. After hours of surgery, Jason was placed on life support in the ICU. His family was told that it was still a close call. "He's hanging on, but the next 24 hours are important," the doctor said. Jason remained [00:10:00] under observation while the staff ran some tests to try and prevent further complications.

The other patient from Friday night, named Sophia, had fainted at home and hit her head on a table. When she passed out, her family called an ambulance. She came to on the way to the hospital, feeling dizzy and disoriented. At the ER, the doctor said, "Let's check her vitals and get some blood work done to rule out anything serious."

After reviewing her results and stitching up her head injury, they found that Sophia was severely dehydrated and had the flu.

They recommended she stay overnight for further observation.

The next morning, Jason's condition began to improve. He was still in the ICU, but off of life support, showing signs of being on the mend. In fact, by the end of the week, he received a clean bill of health and started physical therapy to [00:11:00] get back on his feet. The doctors said it would take months to make a full recovery, but the outlook was good.

Sophia's recovery was much quicker. After rehydrating and taking care of her flu symptoms, she was discharged after three days. "You're lucky," the doctor said. "This could have been much worse, but you're well enough to go home now." As they left the hospital, both Jason and Sophia were grateful for the quick action of the ER staff. For the quick action of the ER staff.

The end.

All right. I know that that was a lot of words in a short story. So let's now take our time and go through all of these definitions.

First, we talk about this happening in the ER. The ER is the emergency room. [00:12:00] This is the part of the hospital where urgent medical care is provided.

Most hospitals in the United States have emergency rooms, but some, the special ones, the really good ones, are considered trauma centers—places for trauma accidents, very serious cases. For example, "He was rushed to the ER after the car accident." I want to go over this, actually. "Rushed to the ER." Being rushed to the ER means that you are quickly taken to the emergency room in order to save your life.

Next up, we hear that everyone was shouting "STAT" at the hospital. This is not just a medical term. This is something that we say often. It means immediately or urgently. So your boss may say, "I need you to finish this project, stat." It's a very common expression when we really need something in an urgent [00:13:00] or immediate way.

The doctor shouted, "We need these test results, stat."

Next up, we have the phrasal verb "wheel in." "Wheel in" is to move a patient on a wheelchair or something with wheels into a room. The paramedics wheeled in the man who had collapsed. So we're going to skip ahead a little bit here and talk about a stretcher. Sometimes we wheel in someone in a wheelchair, sometimes we wheel in someone on a stretcher. A stretcher is a bed on wheels that has handles, and it's used to transport patients. It's essentially a hospital bed that has wheels. Think of the ambulance, um, think of emergency vehicles, helicopters. When they want to transport patients from one place to another, [00:14:00] we use a stretcher.

Sometimes stretchers don't have wheels; they have handles on the sides. So the paramedics or emergency care workers wheeled in the man who had collapsed. That means that they brought him in on a stretcher. The injured athlete was carried off the field on a stretcher.

Next up, we have the phrase "in critical condition." The word "critical" can have multiple meanings in English, but one of the meanings is serious.

"In critical condition" means very serious and life-threatening health status, health conditions. We have three types of conditions in English. We have stable condition, which is where someone is injured but they're good, their life is not in danger. Then we have someone in serious condition, meaning [00:15:00] that they have serious injuries, but for the most part, their life is not in danger, but they have many, many injuries.

And then we have critical condition, where we're not sure if someone's going to survive. Very serious and life-threatening health status. After the surgery, she remained in critical condition for three days.

Next up, we have the expression "code blue." In English, we sometimes use the word "code" plus a color in order to say how serious something is. So "code red" is a code that many businesses have—schools, hospitals—if there's an emergency. "Code red, code red, emergency!" In a hospital, "code blue" is an emergency involving a patient who is in cardiac arrest, so their heart [00:16:00] is not working or they're not breathing. So "code blue," a patient is dying, we need help. When the patient stopped breathing, the staff called a code blue.

Next up, we have vitals. The word vital is used for multiple definitions in English, but one of the main ways is for life, living. Vitals are short for vital signs. Vital signs are your heart rate, your blood pressure, your temperature. These are the things that the computer is going to monitor to see how your life is. The nurse had to check the patient's vitals every hour.

So again, we say vital signs, but the short name for it is vitals.

Next up, we have triage. This is a French word. Triage is very important to know because [00:17:00] triage is where patients are first assessed. If you go to a hospital emergency room here in the United States, there are all these patients sitting in the waiting room. They call you, and the first thing they do is put you in triage. This is when they're assessing your injuries, the severity, which means how severe something is. Sometimes, they'll put five patients in triage, and the one who has the most serious condition will get priority, and will get put into a room first, or get the attention of doctors first.

She sat in the waiting room for three hours before she was brought to triage.

Next up, we have the phrasal verb bleed out. Bleed out is to lose a dangerous amount of blood. Someone's bleeding out. That means that if they continue to bleed, they're going to [00:18:00] die. For example, the victim of the accident nearly bled out before reaching the hospital.

Next up, we have a crash cart. This is a noun. A crash cart is like a unit that's mobile on wheels, and it has all of the emergency medical supplies. So if you're in a hospital and someone needs to give you emergency care, they're going to say, "Hey, I need the crash cart over here." It has things to resuscitate or bring someone back to life, like those paddles that can pump electricity into your heart. We say, "A patient is crashing," meaning that a patient is dying. Their pulse is low, they're not breathing, their heart is not cooperating.

The nurse grabbed the crash cart [00:19:00] when the patient went into cardiac arrest. Cardiac arrest is when a patient's heart stops, stops pumping.

Next up, we have the phrasal verb, scrub in. Alright, so let's break this down a little bit. The word scrub means to clean. But I want you to imagine that you have a really bad stain on your shirt. You bring it to the bathroom, you put soap on it, and you're scrubbing it hard. Like you're, you're moving, you're causing friction to try and remove a stain. So scrubbing in at a hospital is when doctors wash and sterilize their hands before surgery or before they see you. The surgeon scrubbed in before entering the operating room.

Next up, we have the expression touch and go. This is a very important expression to know. Because this means that a [00:20:00] situation is uncertain or critical. So if a doctor tells you your friend's condition is very touch and go, that means that nobody knows what's going to happen. It's like saying someone's in critical condition. After the accident, it was touch and go whether he would survive.

Next up, we have the OR. So we have the ER. Now we have the O. R. Can you guess what the O. R. is? The O. R. is the operating room where surgeries are performed. They prepped her for surgery in the O. R.

Next up, we have an interesting expression, to put under or go under. Typically, we say, "They put her under," or "She went under." Now this means to be given anesthesia or made unconscious for [00:21:00] surgery. Anesthesia, if you don't recognize this word, is the medication that they give you so that you can be unconscious for surgery. So that you don't feel anything that's happening to you. To be put under is when they give you anesthesia, or "he went under." He's now feeling the effects of anesthesia. She was put under because she was getting her appendix removed. We might say, "They just put him under," so that they can start the procedure. And this is not just for the emergency room. This could be at a dentist's office if you are having a procedure that requires you to have anesthesia. They can also say, "She's gonna be put under," "They're putting her under," "I went under anesthesia."

Next up, we have the phrasal verb, patch up. Patch up is when you treat a minor [00:22:00] injury or you temporarily fix something. So patch up is not just used for medical emergencies. Let me give you some examples here. First off, someone gets an injury. They got into a little accident. Maybe they fell down the stairs. They have a lot of injuries on their body. We're gonna say, "The nurse patched him up." Maybe the nurse cleaned some wounds. Maybe they closed some wounds. Maybe if their shoulder goes out of place, they'll set it back. So they're patching him up. They're fixing minor injuries. Now, patch up can also mean a temporary fix. So imagine that your pipes in your house have a leak, and there's water coming out. But the plumber cannot come until tomorrow to fix it. So you're quickly going to patch it up. You're going to temporarily fix it until there's a better solution. The nurse quickly patched him up before [00:23:00] sending him home.

Next up, we have stitch up. Stitch up is kind of like patch up, but it's more specific. Stitches are what we call the little needle and thread that close up a wound. If you cut your hand and you're bleeding and you go to the hospital, you have to get stitches to close the wound. You can say "to get stitches," or they can use the phrasal verb, "stitch up." The doctors stitched him up after his skating accident.

Next up, we have the expression, on life support. On life support means that your body is depending on machines to survive. You are dependent on machines. Without the machines, there is no support for your life. You, you won't [00:24:00] be able to survive. Unfortunately, after the accident, her grandmother was placed on life support.

Next up, we have the ICU. This stands for Intensive Care Unit, and the ICU is the place where critically ill patients receive care. So if someone is in critical condition, if they're going to be in critical condition for a while, they are placed into the ICU. She was admitted to the ICU after her heart attack.

Next up, we have the expression, a close call. A close call is not necessarily just a medical expression. We can use this actually in many different situations, but a close call is a near-death experience, a dangerous experience, something that [00:25:00] happened where we were very close to death or serious injury. For example, the car crash was a close call, but luckily no one was hurt.

Next up, we have the phrasal verb, Hang on or hanging on. If we say that someone is hanging on or just hanging on, it means that someone is barely surviving or they're recovering very slowly, but hope is not completely lost yet.

He's still hanging on, but his condition hasn't improved.

Next up, we have the expression to be under observation. Observation is watching something, right? Monitoring something. To be under observation is when you are being watched closely. This is another example of [00:26:00] an expression that is not just used for medical purposes. This could be in an experiment. This could also be for criminals who are under observation, like the police are watching someone closely. But under observation just means that someone is being closely watched or monitored, and in this specific context, it's someone being monitored or watched by medical staff. After her surgery, she stayed under observation for a whole week.

Next up, we have the expression, run tests. Okay, let's talk about this for a second. So, the word test, we never really say, do a test. Like, if you have an examination, you would say, I'm taking a test. I passed the test. I failed the test. But in this case, we say run tests. To run tests is to perform some [00:27:00] kind of diagnostic test to identify a problem. If you go to your doctor because you don't know what's wrong with you, the doctors are going to try to diagnose you, which means identify the problem. That's why these are called diagnostic tests, because they're used to diagnose or identify the problem. Your doctor's gonna say, Let's run some tests. They can also say, Let's do some tests. But these are the only two contexts where we would say run tests or do tests. The doctor said they needed to run some tests to figure out what was wrong with him.

Next up, we have the expression pass out. To pass out means to faint or lose consciousness. She passed out from dehydration while they were hiking in the mountains. Pass out, yes, it's, this is also the word we use when [00:28:00] someone has had too much alcohol and they pass out. But this is not to be confused with someone who blacked out, meaning someone who drank so much alcohol that everything is black and they can't remember what happened. Their memory is black.

Next up, we have come to. This is the opposite of passing out. To come to means to regain consciousness, to wake up. He came to a few minutes after fainting. Now, I know this is weird because you're like, come to, come to what? But we actually just say, come to, come to. Again, in this sentence, he came to a few minutes after fainting. This means first, he passed out, and then a few minutes later, he regained consciousness. He came to. Next up, we have blood work. So when a laboratory tests a blood sample, we [00:29:00] call this blood work. It's one word, blood work. The doctor ordered blood work to check for infections. Sometimes this can be used to run some tests, but it's a little bit different than run some tests. So running some tests can in fact be blood work or blood tests. But blood work is very specific. It's only blood. Running some tests could be other types of tests, getting x-rays or doing a physical examination. There are a lot of different ways that people can run tests.

Next up, we have the phrasal verb, rule out. This is a great phrasal verb, not just for medical purposes, but for many different types of reasons. Rule out is to eliminate an option. In this context, to eliminate a possible diagnosis. For example, the test results ruled out diabetes as the [00:30:00] cause of his symptoms.

Rule out can also be used in crime. This can even be used for students. Like you're taking a test and you don't know the answer, you can rule out two of the answers. So you're left with two more options. Meaning that you can eliminate an option. So this is a very important phrasal verb to know because we use it in many different contexts, but in the medical context, it means that we eliminate a diagnosis.

So if you have medical issues, the doctors don't know what's going on. They're going to run tests to rule out specific issues.

Next up, we have the expression to be on the mend. This is recovering from an illness, an injury, a sickness. Mend means to fix. So if your shirt rips and you mend it, this means that you fix the rip in your shirt. On the [00:31:00] mend means recovering. After having the flu, she's finally on the mend.

The next two that we have are idioms. Get a clean bill of health and get back on your feet. Firstly, we have to get a clean bill of health. This means that the doctors declare you completely healthy. After months of treatment, he finally got a clean bill of health. You're set. No more issues, you're good.

Next, we have the idiom get back on your feet. This means to recover fully and return to normal activities. After the surgery, it took him 12 weeks to get back on his feet.

Lastly, we have to make a full recovery. In this context, we say make a recovery, but we say make a full recovery. This means to heal completely from an [00:32:00] illness or an injury.

Let me differentiate the last four expressions that you learned, okay? On the mend is when you are recovering. To be back on your feet, get back on your feet, and make a full recovery, these are both that, okay, now you're good. You have fully recovered, completely healed, life is normal. To get a clean bill of health, it could be after an accident, or it could be in general. You go to the doctor next week, you get tests done, you get blood work, your doctor gives you a clean bill of health. You weren't recovering from anything, you're just completely healthy.

Well, I know this was a lot, 30 new vocabulary words, it's a lot, but because this is such an important topic, I really wanted to not leave anything out.

Because of how big this [00:33:00] episode is, don't forget to check out the study guide so that you can practice what you learned.

Well, that's a wrap for today's episode of the Real Life English with Gabby podcast. Be sure to download today's study guide so that you can learn how to use this vocabulary confidently. If you enjoyed this episode, don't forget to subscribe for more weekly adventures in English learning. Also, I'd love to hear from you, so please leave me a review.

Thanks so much for tuning in.