Derogatory Medicine Trivia Quiz

Answer: Gargoyle

Hurler's syndrome is a rare genetic metabolic disease due to an enzyme deficiency. Patients have enlarged livers and spleens with protuberant abdomens. All patients are mentally retarded, hunch-backed, and have gross facial features that are said to resemble the gargoyles of Gothic architecture. The term gargoylism, despite its offensiveness, remains very widely used. 

Answer: Morbid

A person who is either 100 pounds overweight or who has a body mass index (BMI) of greater than 40, is referred to as morbidly obese.  BMI equals a person's weight in kilograms divided by height in meters squared. (BMI=kg/m2).

Answer: Any other children in the family with juvenile hypothyroidism?

Cretinism is a syndrome appearing in early infancy.  It is a result of a deficiency in thyroid hormones during fetal or early life.  If the child does not receive hormone replacement, mental retardation and dwarfism result.  Achondroplasia, Hunter's syndrome, and Human Growth Hormone deficiency all cause their own distinct form of dwarfism.

Answer: Bird-headed dwarfism

Seckel Syndrome is better known as bird-headed dwarfism.   Fortunately, bird headed dwarfism is a rare disorder. The convex, beaked pattern of the nose, the microcephalic head and the absence of ribs contribute to the bird-headed appearance.  Gargoylism and bird-headed dwarfism are real clinical entities; mule-faced goonism is not.

Answer: Monsters

Aileen Wournos may deserve this description, but fetuses that never had a chance to live certainly do not. The "Monster" exhibit at the Mutter Museum was not open to the general pubic when I visited it as a medical student twenty years ago. Hopefully, that has not changed.

Answer: Imbecile

Borderline mental deficiency (IQ 70-80), Moron (IQ 50-69), Imbecile (IQ 20-49) and Idiot (below 20).  Due to the widespread misuse of these terms by the general public, they have been largely replaced by the terms mild, moderate, severe and profound mental retardation.

Answer: Supratentorial

The tentorium cerebelli is formed from the dura mater and separates the cerebrum from the cerebellum. Higher brain functioning (complex thought processing) occurs in the cerebrum, whereas the cerebellum is involved primarily in the coordination of voluntary movement. The cerebrum is located superior to the cerebellum, and thus "supratentorial" is a euphemism for "It's all in your head."

Answer: John Langdon-Down

John Langdon-Down described a condition characterized by mental retardation, short stature, flattened facial features, epicanthal folds (slanted-eyes) and cardiac anomalies. He called the disease Mongolism. He postulated that this disease represented a reversal of evolution from the superior Caucasian Race to the inferior Mongol race. While this disease is more commonly referred to now as Down's Syndrome or Trisomy 21, the term "Mongolism" is still heard.

Answer: Leprechaunism

Leprechaunism is inherited as an autosomal recessive.

Answer: Elephants

Elephantiasis is a disease that causes marked swelling of the extremities. The resemblance of the patient's huge extremities to the large legs of an elephant explains the derogatory name. The disease is caused by multiple parasitic worms, all of which are transmitted by mosquitoes. Elephantiasis is most commonly found in African nations.