Live Lesson Notes

Medicine

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What you will learn

Links
Vocabulary
COVID
Alternative Medicines
Idioms
Sample Answers

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Some useful Links
Find more great vocabulary to talk about COVID
https://www.esolcourses.com/content/topics/health/vocabulary/viral-
illnesses.html

Know your bugs, viruses, bacteria and parasites

https://theconversation.com/know-your-bugs-a-closer-look-at-viruses-
bacteria-and-parasites-49695

Kinds of alternative medicines

https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/health/wellness-and-prevention/
types-of-complementary-and-alternative-medicine

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Essential Vocabulary

For very technical topics, like medicine, science or technology, you

don’t need to know all the technical language or ideas, but you do
need to know the basics.

A useful phrase to use with the examiner is the following. It shows

off good English and sounds very natural.

I’m not an expert, but I think….

I’m by no means an expert, but I think….

When you have a health problem inside your body, we use the
following words:

Sickness / illness / ailment / disease

A disease tends to be long term

A chronic disease = there is no cure for it

Examples of illnesses are:

A cold (you have a runny nose, you’re sniffing and coughing)

The flu (you have a fever, you have a high temperature, you are
sweating)
a bug (a bacteria)
a virus (it is highly contagious)
an infection (n.)
it is infectious (adj.)

I’ve got a / an _______

I’ve caught a ________

I’ve caught a cold and now I have a high temperature. I might have a
fever.

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When you have a health problem outside your body, we use the
following:

Injury

a broken bone
a cut
a burn
a sprained ankle / twisted ankle

Medicine (n.)
1) Something you take to cure an illness
2) a field of study

Medication (n.)
Something you take to cure an illness (same as medication)

We buy medicine in a ….

Chemist (GB) / Pharmacy (US) / Drug store (US)

Different types of medicine

• Pills
• Syrups
• Creams
• Antibiotics (to tackle infections)
• Vaccines (to treat viruses)

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Vaccines give us immunity (n.)
Vaccines build our immunity (n.)

A strong / weak immune (adj.) system

The doctor looked at my symptoms, diagnosed me, and then

prescribed some medicine

She put me on a course of antibiotics

I need to take some medicine

COVID Vocabulary

I hate wearing a face mask

This vaccine can boost your immunity
Social distancing is really important
I don’t like taking pills, especially capsules

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Lockdown or confinement have meant we have had to spend a lot of
time at home, without going out to socialise.
Quarantine is needed for anyone coming into the country with a fever.
Some older people choose self-isolation to keep themselves safe.
The Covid pandemic has changed our lives significantly

Find more great vocabulary to talk about COVID here

https://www.esolcourses.com/content/topics/health/vocabulary/viral-
illnesses.html

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How has Covid changed the way you live?

I cannot socialise as much as I used to

I have to stay isolated at home and I have become a couch potato

(=lazy)

Many people have started working from home

A lot of people have been laid off or made redundant, and so lost their
main sources of income

I have started studying more online

My whole schooling has moved online

Before I could travel anywhere quite freely, no there are lots of

restrictions on travel, especially international travel

It has completely transformed my daily routine, now I feel I am in a bit

of a rut (=stuck in the same boring routine)

It has turned my life upside down. Now I cannot visit my family due to
lockdown and so I feel quite lonely.

It has forced my to wear a face mask all the time. I am really a lot more
cautious and careful about general hygiene now

It’s not only affected me personally, but the whole economy, so we are
heading for a recession now (=bad economic situation)

COVID has killed off the livelihood of many people, learning them

feeling hopeless and even depressed.

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What is your opinion about alternative medicines?

The following are some of the more common and well known alternative
medicines.

Most of them take a holistic approach to treating the body and also tend
to focus on preventing disease rather than treating it after it happens.

Herbal medicine - using plants

Acupuncture - using needles to touch pressure points
Ayurveda - ancient herbal-based medicine
Homeopathy - lets the body cure/heal itself using tiny amounts of
natural medicine (plants and minerals)
Chiropractic medicine - aligning bones, muscles through manipulation
Chinese medicine - use of natural plants and herbs to prevent illness

IN FAVOUR

I actually trust these alternative approaches more than modern

medicine, I mean they have been around a long time and are tried and
tested.

I think they are great, as they take a holistic look at your body, so they
make sense to me.

I suppose some of them are good, for example, I have done

acupuncture and it worked for me. Maybe they are a good
complement to modern medicine.

I think they tend to be more popular with the older generation, but
younger people tend to favour more modern approaches to medicine

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AGAINST

To be honest, I am a bit sceptical, they don’t seem to be science-

based to me, so I don’t know if they really work

I think they are mumbo jumbo (=nonsense), I mean they is no scientific

evidence that they work

I am in two minds about it, some people swear by homeopathy, but I

wonder if it just works like a placebo (=a fake medicine that works
because you believe it is a real medicine)

The only evidence that they work is anecdotal, I don’t think they are
very scientific

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Idioms - Health and Medicine

The following expressions are used to talk about not feeling well, or
feeling a little sick.

I feel under the weather

I feel off

I fell off colour

I have a splitting headache = a terrible headache

You look as pale as ghost = you don’t look well

The following expressions are used to talk about recovering and feeling
healthy again.

The doctor gave me a clean bill of health

I feel as fit as a fiddle = to be healthy

I feel fighting fit = to be healthy

To be on the mend = to be recovering

to be back on my feet = = to have recovered from a sickness

He is the picture of health = he looks very healthy

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Sample Answers

Keith, do you think health is important? Why?

Absolutely, to be honest, I think health is probably one of the most

important things in our life.

I mean sure, things like family, friends, and money, and wealth, job
security are all pretty important, but if you don’t have your health, then
you can’t make the most of any of those other things.

So, I think it’s essential that we look after our health and that we try to
stay fighting fit.

You know, that if ever we do feel under the weather that to take some
kind of medicine to try and sort yourself out, so that you will be as fit
as a fiddle and then enjoy life a lot more.

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Keith, have you used alternative medicine?

It’s an interesting question. The short answer is, yes, I have!

I am a real advocate of (=I am a fan of) using a holistic approach to

staying healthy, preventing disease, as well as treating disease.

So, of course if you fall sick, I do sometimes take medicine whether it’s
pills or antibiotics, but I have also used different kinds of alternative
medicine.

I’ve been treated by a ‘Chiro practitioner’ (we should say

“chiropractor”) who did manipulation of my bones to help me when I
had back problems. I have also had acupuncture and that was
interesting because it’s quite strange having needles put into your body
on different pressure points and then waiting for the impact, and of
course, you don’t feel the direct impact.
I think, as with a lot of alternative medicines, it takes a long time for the
body to regain balance and so you don’t have an immediate impact,
but long term, yes it can help so.
So, yes I …, for me it’s not a choice one or the other, I use a lot different
kinds of medicine.

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