I have always thought of colic not as a specific disease but as a way of describing symptoms which seem to indicate some discomfort in the abdominal region - may be caused by a variety of situations.  This is also the way that we use it in referring to a horse with certain symptoms - the horse is acting "colicky."  In fact, the horse may not have abdominal pain after all or may indeed have abdominal pain caused by anything from eating green apples to a bowel twist - but colicky is usually the first word we use to describe the behavior that we are seeing and a vet knows exactly what that means, although she may ask for more specifics to try to nail things down.

I think it is kind of like the formula thing - we all have our preferred names for it, I myself most like modified cow's milk or modified soy milk, etc., but the fact of the matter is, everyone knows what we mean when we say formula and the semantics of it all does not seem to matter much to the great majority of the public and medical profession who don't have the time or energy to debate the "true meaning" of the word.  I hate using BM and ABM because of its similarity to the commonly used abbreviation for "bowel movement"  and would much prefer to use HM and AHM (human milk and artificial human milk) but those seem to be the accepted abbreviations for now.  And so it goes....



Warmly,
Sharon Knorr, BSMT, ASCP, IBCLC
Newark, NY (near Rochester on Lake Ontario)
mailto:[log in to unmask]

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