pseudopatient

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English

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WOTD – 30 March 2019

Etymology

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From pseudo- +‎ patient.

Pronunciation

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Noun

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pseudopatient (plural pseudopatients)

  1. (dated) A person who pretends to be ill, especially to gain some benefit.
    Synonym: malingerer
    • 1833, [James Ellsworth De Kay], chapter XXXI, in Sketches of Turkey in 1831 and 1832. By an American, New York, N.Y.: Printed and published by J[ames] & J[ohn] Harper, […], →OCLC, pages 307–308:
      [W]e were informed of a Frank physician who had been rewarded for his professional services by the present of a house, valued at five thousand dollars. […] The original proprietor appeared, and was received with great courtesy by the doctor, who prescribed immediately for some chronic disease of which the Armenian complained. The sum of $500 was put into his hands with great formality by the pseudo patient, and he stopped the grateful doctor's thanks immediately, by informing thim that this sum was not a fee, but an equivalent for the original purchase-money of his house, which he civilly requested him to evacuate as soon as possible.
    • 1865, Elizabeth Sheppard, “Odyle”, in Counterparts, or The Cross of Love, Boston, Mass.: Published by T. O. H. P. Burnham, […], →OCLC, page 79, column 2:
      On one of the velvet sofas, full in the firelight, lay Federne asprawl. […] Federne started up and roared; caught Sarona by both his hands, and nearly shook his arms off; gave him no time to speak or escape (though Sarona still maintained his cue, and stared roundly upon his pseudo[-]patient), but bade Moss open the folding-doors, and led him in in triumph.
    • 1871 October, “The Sons of Iscariot; or, The Legacy of a Traitor. A Romance.”, in G. A. Walstab, Marcus Clarke, editors, The Australian Journal: A Family Newspaper of Literature and Science, volume VII, number 77, Melbourne, Vic.: Clarson, Massina, and Co., printers and publishers, […], published 1872, →OCLC, part II (The Fatal Passion), chapter IV (Nemesis), page 83, column 1:
      As he [an old madman] walked, his foot came in contact with the inert body of the doctor extended upon the floor, surrounded by a sea of blood. The poor fool stooped and examined the object on the ground, and suddenly a gleam of reason came into his benighted brain, for he took Ali Kan's body tenderly into his arms, raised it, and drew out the murderer's weapon implanted in his bosom. In doing this, his eyes fell upon Tony, who now seemed spellbound, dividing his attention between the action of his pseudo-patient and the phantom in white. More light seemed to dawn in the idiot's brain, for, letting the doctor slip back on to the floor, he threw himself upon Tony, and struck him with the knife, upon which the blood of Ali Kan was still wet.
    • 1873, J. S. Bell, “Clinical Cases”, in Edwin A. Lodge, editor, The American Observer: A Monthly Journal of Homœopathic Materia Media, […], volume X, Detroit, Mich.: Printed and published at Lodge's Homœopathic Pharmacy, […], →OCLC, page 327:
      His friends inform me my pseudo patient is still in bed enjoying a good appetite and apparently as well and fleshy as ever. His father when about the same age was troubled with the same malingering trouble; although in seeming good health, he persisted in keeping his bed for five years.
    • 1881 August, B. Burford Rawlings, “The Finance of Unendowed Hospitals”, in Fraser’s Magazine, volume XXIV, number CXL (New Series; number 620 overall), London: Longmans, Green, and Co. […], →OCLC, page 215:
      [C]ases not seldom occur where patients are discovered to be the recipients of dual treatment, and there is reason to believe that attendance at a hospital is often used as a means of obtaining alms in a form more acceptable than drugs, and that the latter are unceremoniously made away with in any manner rather than by pouring them down the pseudo-patient’s throat.
  2. (medicine) A person who poses as a patient so that research may be conducted or staff trained.
    Most of the pseudopatients were falsely diagnosed with mental disorders.
    • 1973 January 19, D[avid] L. Rosenhan, “On Being Sane in Insane Places”, in Science‎[1], volume 179, number 4070, Washington, D.C.: American Association for the Advancement of Science, →DOI, →ISSN, →OCLC, →PMID, archived from the original on 26 September 2018, page 257, columns 2–3:
      It is clear that we cannot distinguish the sane from the insane in psychiatric hospitals. […] I and the other pseudopatients in the psychiatric setting had distinctly negative reactions. We do not pretend to describe the subjective experiences of true patients. Theirs may be different from ours, particularly with the passage of time and the necessary process of adaptation to one’s environment. But we can and do speak to the relatively more objective indices of treatment within the hospital.
    • 1997, Nancy Carrick, Lawrence Finsen, “Evaluating Arguments II: Inductive Reasoning”, in The Persuasive Pen: An Integrated Approach to Reasoning and Writing (The Jones and Bartlett Series in Philosophy), Sudbury, Mass.: Jones and Bartlett Publishers, →ISBN, page 169:
      Perhaps even more disturbing than the professionals’ failure to discover their pseudopatients’ “sanity,” the psychiatrists interpreted their “normal” behaviors as confirming the initial diagnoses. For example, when the pseudopatients kept notes of their experiences, one professional marked on a pseudopatient’s chart that he had engaged in “writing behavior.” In another case, a pseudopatient pacing the hall from boredom was interpreted as pacing from nervousness.
    • 2002, H[arvey] Russell Bernard, Research Methods in Anthropology: Qualitative and Quantitative Methods, 3rd edition, Walnut Creek, Calif., Lanham, Md.: AltaMira Press, →ISBN, page 414:
      Samuel Sarkodie, an M.A. student in medical sociology at the University of Legon in Ghana, spent three days in a rural hospital in 1994 as a pseudopatient with a false case of malaria. The hospital staff were in on the study— […]

Translations

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