Master 151 Medical Abbreviations: Lab Values, Drug Routes and Chart Shorthand
Decode 151 medical abbreviations fast: ABG, BUN, ESR, INR, MCHC, prn, po, NPO and the Latin dosing block you should read but never write.
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How to Memorize Medical Terminology: 196 Flashcards on Prefixes, Suffixes and Word Roots
Learn medical terminology the fast way: 196 flashcards on Greek and Latin prefixes, suffixes, roots, body planes and movement terms, plus two building tips.
Medical abbreviations are not vocabulary — they are a decoding skill. On a ward round you read them at a glance or you don't read the chart at all. The Medical Abbreviations deck (code HJ1863, 151 cards) on Flip It is a straight A-to-Z list of the shorthand used in notes, prescriptions and lab reports, which makes it fast to learn and easy to mis-study.
Study this deck: Medical Abbreviations
1 / 10ABG
Tap the card for the answer · swipe right if you knew it, left if not
What is inside the list
Roughly half is lab and clinical: ABG, ACE, ACTH, ADH, ALP, ALT, AST, ATP, BMR, BUN, CBC, CK, CPK, CSF, ECF, ICF, ESR, GFR, G6PD, Hb, Hct, HCO3, HLA, IgA, INR, LDH, LDLc, MCH, MCHC, MCV, MIC, PaCO2, PaO2, PMN, PT, PTT, SaO2, TIBC, RBC and WBC.
A block of conditions and procedures: AIDS, BPAD, BPD, COPD, GVHD, MI, RA, SBE, SIDS, SLE, TB, URI, URTI, UTI, D&C, T&A, EGD, ERCP, IVU, CT, MRI, PET, ECG, EEG, CPR, AED, BLS, TPN and PPD.
A block of orders and routes — the Latin: bid, tid, qid, q, qn, hs, prn, po, IM, IV, sc, NPO, NSAID, SSRI, ASA, OTC. Plus agencies and standards (CDC, FDA, WHO, HIPAA, SI, BCG, DTP) and one large tail of units: dL, g, kg, L, lb, mg, mL, mm, ng, nm, pg, mEq, mmol, IU, mIU, kcal, Gy, Hz, ppm, and the micro series.
Sample cards
| Front | Back |
|---|---|
| ABG | Arterial blood gas |
| BUN | Blood urea nitrogen |
| ESR | Erythrocyte sedimentation rate |
| ERCP | Endoscopic retrograde cholangiopancreatography |
| hs | At bedtime |
| prn | As needed (pro re nata) |
| NPO | Nothing by mouth / nil by mouth |
| INR | International normalized ratio |
| GVHD | Graft-versus-host disease |
| MCHC | Mean corpuscular hemoglobin concentration |
Two tips for this deck
Split the units off and kill them in one sitting. About 25 of the 151 cards are plain measurement: g, kg, dL, mL, mm, ng, nm, pg, mEq, mmol, kcal, Hz, Gy, ppm, IU, mIU, plus microgram, microlitre, micrometre and micromole. If you already know metric prefixes, those are free cards — clear them first so your review queue stops being padded, and give your real attention to the 25 or so multi-word lab abbreviations (MCHC, TIBC, G6PD, PaCO2) where the trap is reciting three words out of four.
Learn the Latin dosing block to read, not to write. bid, tid, qid, q, qn, hs, po, prn and sc all appear here as standard, and you must recognise them instantly in older notes. But several sit on error-prone lists in modern practice — hs has been confused with "half-strength", qn with qh, and sc is safer written as "subcut" — so the rule is: decode them, then write the words out in full. Turning that into a mental tag on each card ("read-only") is the single most useful thing this deck can teach you.
Three cards to annotate. CK and CPK are the same enzyme, CPK being the older name — merge them mentally so you don't count two facts where there is one; same story with URI and URTI. The card pH = hydrogen ion concentration is loose: pH is the negative base-10 logarithm of hydrogen ion activity, which matters the moment you reason about a one-unit drop meaning a tenfold change. And C answers "Celsius; centigrade; complement" — a reminder that context, not the letters, decides the meaning.
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Related: How to Memorize Medical Terminology: 196 Flashcards on Prefixes, Suffixes and Word Roots
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