A Nurse's lament

Complete the text below by filling each gap with one of the following verbs:

dressing setting giving taking off

taking saving fitting

sterilising taking out transplanting performing

Well, don't you think it's unfair? There they are upstairs, .…………. bones, ..……….. skin grafts, ……….... pacemakers, ……….... organs, ……….... lives and exciting things like that. And here I am spending the whole of my day ……….... people's pulse, ……….... injections, ……….... bandages, ……….... stitches, ……….... wounds and ……….... bottles. And to think they earn four times as much money for all the fun they have!

Reading

Prevention is better than cure.

HIS LIFE IS IN YOUR HANDS

Beautiful isn't he? The sort of child any parents would be proud of.

Hard to imagine that until a few months ago this little boy

was in mortal danger and nearly lost his life.

Without proper vaccination he was at the mercy

of every germ, virus, bacterial disease around.

Don't take the risk!

Make sure your child is fully inoculated. Today!

GIVE YOUR CHILD A FAIR CHANCE - TO LIVE!

Task 1. Write or act out conversations in a doctor's surgery – rather longer than the ones you read earlier – in which a doctor, a patient and the patient's mother, wife or husband discuss how the patient should recover from the operation he or she is about to have.

Task 2. List and give reasons for five golden rules for keeping healthy.

Task 3. Debate or write about the topic: Nobody wants to live till they're a hundred and ten. Organise your thoughts carefully before you begin.

Task 4. Describe the remedies or treatments you have heard of for the complaints and accidents listed below.

1. a bad burn

2. nosebleed

3. frostbite

4. hiccups

5. a hangover

6. a fish-hook in the finger

7. a cold

8. a person who's fainted

9. a person who's nearly drowned

Task 5. Write a letter to a friend from your hospital bed, describing your way of life for the past few weeks, before and since your operation.

Task 6. Write, in dialogue form, a conversation between a GP (General Practitioner or family doctor), a parent and a very spotty child.

Alternative therapy

A. Iridologists examine the eye for irritation or deposits in nerve fibres, which they say correspond to inflammation or infection in the body. They also claim to detect inherent weaknesses, and can discover whether a person has a predisposition for certain illnesses.

B. Aromatherapy uses essential oils from plants, which are diluted with a carrier oil being rubbed into the skin. Different plants are supposed to have different healing properties. Like other massages, it’s soothing, pleasant and relaxing.

C. Homeopathy is based on the principle of using ‘similars’ or ‘like to treat like’. A German doctor, Samuel Hahnemann, found that using substances at extreme dilutions and shaking them violently produced a correspondingly more powerful effect. This process of ‘potentizing’ has become the key feature of homeopathy.

D. In acupuncture, needles are inserted at an acupuncture point, then aligned with energy pathways called ‘meridians’, which connect internal organs with points along the body's surface. The needles are rotated clockwise or anti­clockwise, according to whether energy is to be stimulated or damped down.

Task 1. What makes these various treatments different from more conventional medicine? What treatment could be offered in their place?

Task 2. Choose one alternative therapy which you find particularly interesting. Make a list of the reasons why you would or would not want to try it, then discuss your reasons with your partner.

Task 3. You are going to hear an acupuncturist talking about his work. Before you listen, read the sentences. Then, as you listen, focus on the answers in 1-10 and listen out for any differences in wording on the tape.

9 LISTENING