Thank you to everybody who has replied. Please find below my original
request and then a summary of responses. In summary, it seems that
there is no general officially approved list, but that there are of
course several useful relevant web pages and publications. It is
obvious that the same abbreviation can mean different things to
different people. Hopefully, the context makes it clear which one is
intended.
Regards,
Paul Lee
Information Officer
------------------------------------------------
Learning Centre, Health First, Mary Sheridan House, 15 St Thomas St,
London, SE1 9RY 020 7188 2862, fax: 020 7378 6789,
[log in to unmask] www.healthfirst.nhs.uk
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I have been asked by someone within clinical governance if there
exists
an officially approved list of acronyms of standard clinical terms
used
within the NHS, for example: BP equals blood pressure; TPR=
temperature, pulse and respiration.
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Web sites
Royal College of General Practitioners acronym finder:
http://www.rcgp.org.uk/default.aspx?page=510
"This database contains medical acronyms and abbreviations relating to
both clinical terminology and medical organisations. The content is
supplied by Medilexicon."
The Royal College of General Practitioners also have this more select
static list of acronyms and abbreviations:
http://www.rcgp.org.uk/default.aspx?page=4134
The following from University of Nottingham looks good for clinical
bodies rather than clinical terminology, but has not been updated since
2001:
http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/cpcme/edu/Acronym.htm#B
There's a list of abbreviations intended for use in Pharm-line
abstracts at
http://www.pharm-line.nhs.uk/help/Standard_P-L_abbreviations.doc
Cambridge City and South Cambridgeshire Primary care Trusts:
Abbreviations for use in Clinical Documentation (November 2005):
http://www.southcambs-pct.nhs.uk/documents/Staff_Information/Policies/guidelines/PCT%20Approved%20Abbreviations.pdf?preventCache=15%2F12%2F2005+
Wikipedia has a list of medical acronyms and abbreviations:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_medical_abbreviations
Acronyms and Initialisms for Health Information Resources by Marie-Lise
Antoun Shams:
http://www.geocities.com/~mlshams/acronym/acr.htm
University of Exeter medical school has a list of links to several
acronym busters:
http://www.services.ex.ac.uk/eml/Acronyms
There is a general acronym finder at:
http://www.acronymfinder.com/
The following is about standards set by the JCAHO in USA in 2004 on
prohibited abbreviations
http://www.aapmr.org/hpl/pracguide/jcahosymbols.htm
Institute for Safe Medication Practices: List of error prone
abbreviations, symbols and dose designations (2006)
http://www.ismp.org/tools/errorproneabbreviations.pdf#search=%22ISMP%20a
bbreviations%22
JDMD (medical and dental malpractice consultants) Medical
abbreviations
glossary
http://www.jdmd.com/glossary/medabbr.pdf#search=%22allintitle%3A%20medic
al%20abbreviations%20%22
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Books
Australian dictionary of clinical abbreviations, acronyms and symbols
.
4th ed (2004)
(Probably only print form - has to be purchased):
http://www.himaa.org.au/whatsnew.html
Dictionary of Medical Acronyms and Abbreviations (Dictionary of Medical
Acronyms & Abbreviations (W/CD) by Stanley Jablonski:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Dictionary-Medical-Acronyms-Abbreviations-Paperback/dp/1560536322/sr=8-1/qid=1167994440/ref=sr_1_1/026-2092952-6222820?ie=UTF8&s=books
Acronyms and Synonyms in Medical Imaging (second edition: 2002) by
Nicola Strickland:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Acronyms-Synonyms-Medical-Imaging-Strickland/dp/184184165X/sr=1-2/qid=1167994597/ref=sr_1_2/026-2092952-6222820?ie=UTF8&s=books
Mnemonics for MRCP by Tim Nicholson:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Mnemonics-MRCP-Tim-Nicholson/dp/1904627986/sr=11-1/qid=1167994784/ref=sr_11_1/026-2092952-6222820
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