14 Unit 5 CABULARY Pain is important because it tells us that we are injured orill. However,we don't all feel pain in the same way. Researchers are trying to learn more aboutthisfact. Their experiments show that children are more sensitive to pain than adults, and that men can tolerate more pain than women. Pain is also difficult to measure and describe This is a problem because it is an important symptom and medics (medical staff)need information from patients about it. It is therefore common practice to give patients lists of words and ask them to say which words best describe three things: the type of pain they are suffering, its intensity (how bad it is) and its frequency (how often they feel it). With some patients, such as schildren, words don't work very well to describe intensity so medics use smiley faces or sometimes colours For example, blues mean a mild pain and reds mean severe pain. Some medics prefer a range of numbers; o is no pain and 10 is unbearable pain. Pain does not always show where an injury is. Internal organs, for example, do not have many pain- receiving nerve endings, so internal injuries often cause pain in a different part of the body. This is called'referred pain". One example of referred pain is when someone suffering a heart attack feels pain in their left shoulder, arm or hand. Offord English-for Careers Nursing 1.Practic File Oxford University Press 2011 3 Comprehension Usetheinformation in the textto complete the sentences with a,bor c 1 Researchers are trying to find out why __ a people experience pain differently b people feel pain. c painisimportantto people. 2 Experiments showthat __ a painisworseformenthan women b mencan take more painthan women. c childrenfeelless painthan adults. 3 Nurses need to measure apatient's pain because __ a painisaproblem. b pain is a symptom. c patientscan't describeit. 4 Medics ask patient for a number to describe __ c how often they'reinpain. 5 To describe pain medics ask children to __ a point to asmiley face. b think of some numbers c say howit feels. __ b long after aninjury. c in adifferent place from an injury.