At the chemist’s

Chemist’s shops are specialized shops where medicines are sold. At the chemist’s there are two departments: a prescription department and a chemist’s department. At the prescription department medicines are sold or made up according to prescriptions. At the chemist’s department one can buy medicines without prescriptions.

At the chemist’s all medicines are kept in drug cabinets, on the open shelves and in the refrigerator. Every small bottle, a tube or a box has a label with the name of the medicine. There are labels of four colours: green labels indicate medicines for internal use; blue labels indicate drugs for injections, labels of a yellow colour indicate drugs for external application and labels of a pink colour indicate drugs for the treatment of eye diseases. The single dose and the total dosage are indicated on the label.

At the chemist’s one can buy different drugs for intramuscular and intravenous injections, tubes of ointments, different pills and tablets for internal use, tonics and sedatives; drugs for cough and headache; cardiac medicines; herbs and things for medical care (hot-water bottles, medicine droppers, cups, thermometers) and many other things.

One must be careful using medicine.

At the Chemist’s shop

Customer: (C) – Hello. Here is the prescription. Can you make it up?

Chemist: (Ch) – Yes, we have all the medicines (drugs) but number 4. For this we do have substitute, but you will have to get this drug prescribed by the doctor first because it is a special pain killer. This medicine is out of stock for quite some time.

C – OK. I just go to the doctor and get the substitute prescribed. Will you please write the name of the substitute drug on this prescription on the back?

Ch – Please go to counter no. 1 and he will do the needful.

C – ( Customer goes to counter no. 1)  Sir, I am quite in haste as my son is suffering from severe pain. Kindly write the name of the drug on the back of this prescription as suggested by the gentleman at counter no. 4.

Ch – OK. I write here.

C – Thanks. I am coming back within 15 minutes. Can you please get all the drugs (medicines) ready in the mean time with the bill, so that I can come and take and reach as early as possible to my family.

Ch – OK. We will do that. Hurry up.

Electrocardiography

Electrocardiography (ECG) is a transthoracic (across the thorax or chest) interpretation of the electrical activity of the heart over a period of time, as detected by electrodes attached to the outer surface of the skin and recorded by a device external to the body. The recording produced by this noninvasive procedure is termed as electrocardiogram (also ECG or EKG).

ECG is used to measure the rate and regularity of heartbeats, as well as the size and position of the chambers, the presence of any damage to the heart, and the effects of drugs or devices used to regulate the heart (such as a pacemaker).

T he etymology of the word is derived from the Greek electro, because it is related to electrical activity, kardio, Greek for heart, and graph, a Greek root meaning "to write".

Most ECGs are performed for diagnostic or research purposes on human hearts, but may also be performed on animals, usually for research.

The ECG device detects and amplifies the tiny electrical changes on the skin that are caused when the heart muscle depolarizes during each heartbeat. At rest, each heart muscle cell has a negative charge (membrane potential) across its outer wall (or cell membrane). Decreasing this negative charge towards zero (via the influx of the positive cations, Na+ and Ca++) is called depolarization, which activates the mechanisms in the cell that cause it to contract. During each heartbeat, a healthy heart will have an orderly progression of a wave of depolarisation that is triggered by the cells in the sinoatrial node, spreads out through the atrium, passes through the atrioventracular node and then spreads all over the ventricles. This is detected as tiny rises and falls in the voltage between two electrodes placed either side of the heart which is displayed as a wavy line either on a screen or on paper. This display indicates the overall rhythm of the heart and weaknesses in different parts of the heart muscle.

This is the best way to measure and diagnose abnormal rhythms of the heart, particularly abnormal rhythms caused by damage to the conductive tissue that carries electrical signals, or abnormal rhythms caused by electrolyte imbalances. In a myocardial infarction (Ml), the ECG can identify if the heart muscle has been damaged in specific areas, though not all areas of the heart are covered. The ECG cannot reliably measure the pumping ability of the heart, for which ultrasound-based (echocardiography) or nuclear medicine tests are used. It is possible for a human or other animal to be in cardiac arrest but still have a normal ECG signal (a condition known as pulseless electrical activity).

	transthoracic	на грудній клітці
	to detect	відкривати, виявляти
	noninvasive	неінвазивний
	presence	присутність, наявність; постава, осанка
	pacemaker	кардіостимулятор
	to derive	походити, виводити
	root	корінь, причина
	purpose	намір, мета; цілеспрямованість
	to amplify	розширювати(ся); розвивати
	charge	доручення; обов’язок; піклування, охорона
	interpretation	інтерпретація, тлумачення
	sinoatrial node	сіноатральний вузол (відноситься до венозного синусу і правого передсердя серця)
	conductive tissue	провідна тканина
	ultrasound-based	ультразвуковай