What's in a name?

[Morris Gallo]

I believe the proper term is "residuum".


RENARDWC at ctrvax.Vanderbilt.Edu wrote:

> One fine day George Boyer, AMP-L's resident etymologist, suggested:
>
> GB>...Look, re the stump matter, that term was definitely a medical
>    coinage, taken up by people central in the prosthetic business in the
>    early 70s.
>
> This would be in keeping with my experience. When I awoke from surgery
> as a new amputee November 1969 the surgeon who did the job on me
> referred to my stump as a 'stump', both in conversation with me and with
> other medical professionals (nursing staff, PTs, x-ray, et.al). If he
> was aware of another cutesy term, neither he nor the nursing staff used
> it. I heard no other locution used. Hence, I have used it since.
>
> Agreed...it is not a particularly elegant term.
>
> It has also been my experience that newer amputees do not use the term
> with quite the facility us old hands do, and I understand that
> completely. Stump often does not cross their lips with comfort.
>
> Residual limb can also be confused with an unamputated limb since if I
> understand the term residual, it means remaining, and while I have a
> stump on my right side, I have an entire (remaining, or one that remains
> whole) limb on my left haha. So, it my left leg residual since it
> remains intact? I once used it this way and Bill Baughn was there to
> remind me I had it wrong.
>
> Do I care what you use? Naw. But, I believe there is some credence to
> the notion that the words we use express and reflect our thinking, and
> if someone wishes to alter or adjust a mode of thinking, to tweak the
> parameters a wee bit, then the words we chose to describe ourselves do
> indeed matter.
>
> Wayne Renardson