12. Memory for Medics

The twelve cranial nerves are among the many things that must be memorized by all medical students. These twelve cranial nerves: olfactory, optic, oculomotor, trochlear, trigeminal, abducens, facial, auditory, glossopharyngeal, vagus, spinal accessory, and hypoglossal can be pictured easily with the Auto-Magic* system. The first, the olfactory, could be an old factory placed on the radiator ornament of the car; as number two, the optic nerve, could be placed with an eye seeing out of each of the automobile headlights. Some syllable or an exaggerated pronunciation of each of these words could be fitted into the entire Auto-Magic* pic­ture, as in number six, abducens. You could picture someone being abducted and being caught as the window is jammed up to hold him.

Number seven, the facial, could be a face on the horn button; number eight, the steering wheel, could be two big ears to remind you that auditory is the word for the eighth cranial nerve. Number twelve, the hypoglossal, could be shown as a glossy shining hypodermic needle set in place as each hand of the clock, which is number twelve in the Auto-Magic* system. By stretching the imagination and making it work actively, you can bring to mind these medical terms.

Initialing these nerves to form a word or a sentence is another system that can work into a permanent memory rhyme. The one most used in medical schools throughout America is: "On old Olympus' towering top a Finn and German viewed a hof."

The bones of the wrist can be memorized easily by the initialing method or by the Auto-Magic* system. The Auto-Magic* system, through exaggerated pronunciations of words, is most effective. For instance, the scaphoid bone can be converted into a scaffold and placed as number one on the radiator ornament of the car, and so on through the bones of the wrist.

The muscles of the leg or any other series of parts or objects may be similarly placed.

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