General
shotgunning
What does shotgunning mean?
When a clinician has no clue what's wrong, so they fire off a huge battery of bloods, scans and panels in the hope something comes back abnormal and points the way. Named after the buckshot spread — aim vaguely, hit something. Seniors hate it because it's expensive and lazy; juniors do it on nights when they're drowning.
"The SHO shotgunned him — CT, troponin, D-dimer, the lot. Still doesn't know what's wrong."
Origin
Anglo-American medical slang.
Frequently asked questions
What does shotgunning mean in medicine?
Shotgunning means ordering every test under the sun and hoping one of them lands on a diagnosis.
How do you use shotgunning in a sentence?
"He's just shotgunning labs instead of actually working up the patient."
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