Jonathan Law - A Dictionary of Nursing

This new edition of A Dictionary of Nursing provides, in over 10,500 entries, explanations of the terms and concepts likely to be encountered by student and practising nurses and allied health professionals during the course of their work and training. In addition to terms relating specifically to the nursing profession and the nursing process, there are many entries in the fields of medicine, surgery, anatomy and physiology, ethics, statistics, endocrinology, psychiatry, and pharmacology. For this edition, many new terms have been added, increasing the coverage of such fields as radiography, dentistry, public health, and epidemiology. Drug names reflect the use of recommended International Non-proprietary Names (rINNs).

Each entry contains a pronunciation guide, the part of speech, and a concisely written definition without the use of unnecessary technical jargon. The pronunciation guide follows that used in the Oxford Paperback Dictionary and provides an easy and accessible guide to correct pronunciation without the use of special symbols. Most definitions comprise a single sentence, but, where necessary, further explanation is given. Many terms in medicine are used in combination (for example, acute abscess, apical abscess, etc.) and each of these phrases is treated as a separate definition within the main entry (abscess in this example). Derived terms (for example, adjectives derived from nouns) are not normally included as separate entries except where their meanings cannot be deduced from the words from which they are derived. Instead they are listed at the end of the definition of the parent word together with the part of speech and, where necessary, a pronunciation guide.

The Appendices include a comprehensive selection of tables of reference values for biochemical data, obtained from the Oxford Textbook of Medicine (fifth edition, 2005), together with tables of SI units, conversion tables to and from other systems of units, formulae for calculating drug dosages, and immunization schedules. For this edition we have also included the most recent (2018) version of the NMC Code of professional conduct, together with a summary of the standards of proficiency set out in the same organizations Future Nurse (also 2018).

In the preparation of this dictionary a range of entries has been adapted from the Concise Medical Dictionary , first published by the Oxford University Press in 1980 (tenth edition published 2020).

J. L.

T. McF.

2020