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Learner Reviews & Feedback for Clinical Terminology for International and U.S. Students by University of Pittsburgh

4.8
stars
3,009 ratings

About the Course

Understanding the clinical terms and abbreviations commonly used during verbal or written communication in U.S. hospitals is challenging. This course is designed for U.S. health care profession students and for international students and practitioners who want to become more familiar with the language of the U.S. clinical setting. Others, such as caregivers and medical interpreters, who wish to develop a better understanding of terms and abbreviations used by health care providers will find this course helpful. The course provides visual and auditory learning experiences to enhance the understanding of terms and abbreviations commonly encountered on a general U.S. hospital unit. All content including quizzes are available at no cost to the learner. If you need a certificate, you can apply for financial aid or pay the fee. To find out more, click Learn more and apply next to the information about Financial Aid. (Use a computer, not a mobile device, for this step.)...

Top reviews

FB

Jan 1, 2018

This course was really helpful. I took notes and will review them often to keep abreast with the medical terms. These will also help me communicate clinically with my PCP. I truly enjoyed this course!

ER

Apr 15, 2019

The instructor's calm and clear explanations make this a joy to watch.

This course is very useful for me as a medical product translator to get an understanding of the actual clinical environment.

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701 - 725 of 791 Reviews for Clinical Terminology for International and U.S. Students

By Karyl M

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Mar 17, 2022

This was a good course for beginners as it laid the groundwork for puzzling out clinical terms and getting used to what they would sound like when spoken. I appreciated the little bits of humour sprinkled into some of the multiple choice answers. It seems to be a course better designed as a companion to other terminology courses or maybe the first step for someone thinking of joining the healthcare industry. There are also good resources that can be referenced in future. I took off one star because there were a few glitches in the course such as broken links or typos which have apparently not been addressed by staff. I would have liked to see more active involvement from staff on the discussion boards for support and clarification on topics covered, even if only on a weekly basis. A few questions, even if asked multlple times over a span of 2-3 years, seem to have gone completely unanswered.

By Emily D

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Apr 11, 2022

I'm really rating this class between 3.5 and 4 stars. While I definitely enjoyed the class videos and education, some of the material was confusing. For example: One module tells you about 5 different pulse points on the body, but only defines 3 of them. One of the non-defined pulse points (pedal) is then on the Week 6 quiz with no explanaion for why it is in the quiz that has nothing to do with pedal pulses and was never defined in the first place. Also, the Clinical Terminology Dictionary for this class was missing several words and definitions that certain weeks tell you specifically to look up! I ended up using Google instead mostly for definitions and examples and while the message board helped with some explanations and questions I had, it was still a bit frustrating and annoying. Overall it was well done, but could use some fine tuning.

By Yolanda L

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Dec 14, 2020

Some times things were a little confusing, because some abbreviations being covered in the next section of that week were used in the section before it was introduced.

But otherwise, the forums were a nice addition, and being able to get answers from the professors there is always nice!

Thank you for offering such a class! I hadn't taken a medical terminology course since high school, so it was a struggle at first, but everything came back eventually.

I did have to use dictionaries A LOT for some of the medical disease names. I also think the clinical dictionary offered here could use some help, and more ease of use. It's a big pain to have to keep going back to the menu button to "search for full name" type thing, every single time.

By Brian H

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Mar 26, 2020

Working in the healthcare simulation field for many years as a Simulation Operations Specialist this was an invaluable course. It was challenging at times and made you critically think. I was also surprised and happy about how much I already knew. I loved the audio segments laced throughout each week and access to the Clinical Terminology Dictionary and the audio pronunciations for each word or term. The video quality for some of the videos in section 6 were grainy with low resolution at times and and hard to tell what was actually happening between the nurse and the patient in the case. I had to watch it a few times. Thank you for a great course.

By Jennifer L

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Feb 17, 2019

The course was informative and helpful. Along with other factors, this course has made me more interested in pursuing a degree in nursing. However, this course could have been more challenging with its quizzes. Even then, the last week of the course challenged me to think outside of the parameters of the course. This course lacked many medical terms and abbreviations, but as an introduction course, it was very informative. I leave the class knowing more medical terminology than I knew before entering the class and feel more prepared to enter a medical career.

By Esra K

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Feb 8, 2021

I think this course is well compiled in terms of basic clinical terminology. It is also good for students whom begin to learn latin and terminology bond and use it in their professional life. Of course the more to use the more to memorize.

Life science backgrounded people, as I am, can also make use of this course because it provides a frame to human anatomy, physiology and names of the diseases terminology in the clinical environment. I recommend this course.

By Jen Z

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Feb 6, 2017

I liked the course because it allowed me to complete it in my own time. The material was well documented. I would have liked to have my questions answered in real-time and interactively maybe to others taking the course. There were some quiz questions that didn't reflect the material in the course so I got lost and had to find my own answers on the internet. Overall...I would recommend this course to anyone who would like to learn medical terminology.

By Ben M

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Sep 13, 2020

Interesting, well-paced, and accessible for non-medical students like myself. I enjoyed the course and found it helpful, but would encourage a different open source to use than http://www.clinicalterminology.org/. Some words/acronyms from the course are not listed, and the longer definitions are not fully readable without registering an account. A more comprehensive final quiz/exam for review would be good, too.

By Amanda R

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Sep 18, 2020

This course is great for any one needing a refresher or prerequisite courses for further study. Having been a CNA for 5 years, this course was very easy, but I can see some of the inconsistencies that may be difficult for new learner's. Be sure to use the prefix dictionary, and look up terms you don't know on the internet. Remember, some terms and abbreviations are not at all facilities.

By Leota T

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Mar 13, 2021

The course is a great starting point for learning clinical terminology. There are too many strong points to name. My only negative comment is that some of the quizzes ask questions on topics not covered by the course yet, some do not have the information asked in the videos, and the overall grammar of the course and the clinical dictionary could use a review. Thank you!

By Akhil G N

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Apr 25, 2020

The course was well put together and had a good flow. The order of the lessons made the content fun to learn as we got to apply more and more terms as we moved along. I loved that it gave us cases to apply our knowledge as well. I feel like it could've explained what the normal ranges and consequences of abnormal readings are for certain tests and compounds found in tests.

By Imelda D B

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Feb 4, 2019

It was a good course, but definitely I woul change the name and description of it because it´s full of Clinical abrevations and not so much terminology!

Also I think there are so many others kind of activities to practice the new words, for example using scenarios in each topic will be more useful than just audios. Anyway, it was good. thank you! :D

By Yousef H A

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Dec 9, 2020

I'm a medical student and I have to say that I very much enjoyed this experience as it added to my knowledge a lot and refined some misunderstood technical terms. The only thing I wish would have been better is the quality of the videos and the volume of the clinical simulations in module 6. Thank you all for this amazing experience

By Aurora M

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Oct 1, 2020

A really great into to clinical terminology. The use of multimedia to convey different forms of information reception is really useful but I wouldn't recommend this course to anyone who is Deaf of HoH as sometimes transcriptions are inaccurate or there is a complete lack of written content to accompany verbal examples.

By Indu S

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Jun 4, 2020

Excellent content and exercises that allow thinking out of the box while staying in line with course material.

One comment: Some places the written transcripts do not match with verbal pronunciations e.g in week 6 ER/ED pronounced but written as ET. Overall course is put together very well. Thanks to the team

By Lisa U

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Jan 14, 2021

Methodology is above average, with audio, video and simulations. It would be helped by a QA check for errors, mostly non-substantive but a few substantive. The methodology seems heavily focused on helping non-native English speakers so for native speakers it's rather easy even if you have no medical background.

By Qiuyang ( L

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Sep 20, 2020

Good to have this course that is really useful to learn and review those terms used in clinical settings. Hopefully, I can get a job by showing this. There is only one thing I feel a little uncomfortable that I have to pay $65 to get a real certificate. Anyways, thanks Coursera for the free online course.

By AHMED S

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Sep 19, 2020

I want to thank the P.H.D professor & pittsburg university for this course.. It was really funny and helpful to me ... because medical terminology is a little bit difficult, but with this amazing clarification it becomes fruitful and i really feel happy about finding out the U.S CLINICAL TERMINOLOGY !!!

By raven

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Oct 23, 2017

This was a very useful course, it did what it said, helping me understand the terminology in a clinical setting. As well as comprehend the make up of terminology and the do'sand don't. The only issue were the audio clips were difficult to load on my tablet and had a better chance with them on a pc.

By Irene S

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Jan 25, 2017

This course is very complete in terms of vocabulary and helpful for people who haven't been in a hospital or clinic before to get and idea of how these settings work. The only thing I would have wished for this course to have a little more vocabulary is on diseases, conditions and procedures.

By altini

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Jul 25, 2017

I've become more comfortable with medical terminology. English is my first language but I'm studying to become a medical interpreter. I wish there were less audio in the multiple choice questions. It loads very slowly. Also, feedback would be nice on the free response questions.

By Qing Z

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Oct 21, 2017

a little bit repetitive for the PRS list glossary terms,I mean it's good to get refreshed,but I desire that in different formats rather than a list each time,maybe can consider in a fashion of video,cartoon,etc to make the PRS list even more interesting and picturesque.

By Bindu M

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Nov 29, 2020

The PRS list definitely needs improvement. Many a times a web search was more useful than the PRS list and dictionary. Many a times the assignments felt like a hearing test. Enjoyed the course nevertheless and did gain an understanding of the terminology.

By Hayley V

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Aug 24, 2022

I found this course to be very straightforward. I enjoyed the format of video and audio recordings in addition to readings. The course also provided learners with several helpful resources to review terms, abbreviations and practice clinical scenarios.

By Tuyen T

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Jan 12, 2020

This is a great course for a non-native medical staff like me. It did, of course, not provide me all the clinical term in only 6 weeks, but it really gave me a different perception about modern medical environment and the important of abbreviations.