Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-7c8c6479df-xxrs7 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-03-28T12:19:08.607Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

19 - Constructing sentences

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 September 2014

Neville W. Goodman
Affiliation:
Southmead Hospital, Bristol
Andy Black
Affiliation:
University of Bristol
Get access

Summary

. . . I find it increasingly difficult to understand published papers, even those in my own specialty. I soon become lost in the tortured grammar, the acronyms, and the jargon.

(Anon. In England now. Lancet 1992; 339: 737.)

Your writing will improve if you try to avoid the abused and over-used words, phrases and constructions we discuss in our earlier chapters, and note our suggestions about prepositions, tenses, punctuation, and so on. But it is far less easy to lay down a few simple rules about how to write sentences. We have to say at this stage that there is no substitute for practice: the more you write the better you will become. It is also true that the more widely you read the better you will write but, sadly, medicine tends to be all-consuming.

Remember:

  • that a sentence describes an idea, and can include qualification of that idea;

  • to take care if there is more than one idea, or more than one qualification;

  • to keep linked items – subjects and verbs, ideas and their qualification – together.

It follows that short sentences are less likely to lead writers and readers astray, but short sentences do not guarantee clear writing.

The opening sentence

But before we deal with sentence construction, we need to deal with a sentence that is often a problem not because of its construction but because of its idea: the opening sentence of the Introduction. The medical research article, describing a usually detailed aspect of a medical condition, is by far the commonest form of published medical writing. Although laypeople are reading primary medical research more and more, specialist journals and textbooks are aimed at like-educated readers. Yet this was the opening sentence of a chapter on renal blood flow in a book about regional cardiovascular physiology.

Type
Chapter
Information
Medical Writing
A Prescription for Clarity
, pp. 294 - 309
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2014

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure coreplatform@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×