MELISSA BLOCK, HOST:
Over the past few months on the program we've been hearing from you about trade lingo. We asked you to tell us your terms of the trade - bits of slang from your line of work that might stump anybody on the outside. And we've heard quite a collection.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED BROADCASTS)
UNIDENTIFIED MAN: The word is PEBCAK.
UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN: Flying pickles.
UNIDENTIFIED MAN #2: Chicken in the gate.
UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN #2: Toi toi toi.
UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN #3: Salads over St. Louis.
UNIDENTIFIED MAN #3: It's a one-four-five with a short four.
UNIDENTIFIED MAN #4: Garock (ph).
UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN #4: Frogging.
UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN #5: Uncle Bob.
BLOCK: Well, that last one - Uncle Bob - prompted radiologist Harold Friedman to get in touch with some trade lingo of his own.
HAROLD FRIEDMAN: As soon as I saw that I go, Uncle Bob? Aunt Minnie - perfect.
BLOCK: Aunt Minnie - Doctor Friedman explains the term was coined by a well-known radiologist, Ben Felson, in the mid-1900s. Felson was able to look at a scan and quickly make a complex diagnosis.
FRIEDMAN: And people were always amazed at how he was able to do this. And he'd go, you know, it's like my Aunt Minnie. She'll come to the door, and when I see her I don't say oh, there's an old lady in the door - she's got white hair, she has a slight limp. You know, it could be rows down the street, but I think it might be Aunt Minnie. Instead he just says hello, Aunt Minnie.
BLOCK: No question of who it is or what you are looking at.
FRIEDMAN: Yeah, it's one that you - a radiologic finding is so specific and compelling that there's really no realistic differential diagnosis. You don't have to say it might be this - it might be that. It's absolutely that.
BLOCK: And you're saying that from this one radiologist, Doctor Felson, this term, Aunt Minnie, spread broadly through the radiologist community?
FRIEDMAN: It did because it was such a nice term. And there was really nothing else that encompassed that kind of a thing. You know, sometimes people say I get a gut feeling or I have a gestalt about what it is. But that really doesn't tell you the kind of thing like an Aunt Minnie.
Aunt Minnie is really related to - you have the knowledge base, you've seen it before. It's this, just like your Aunt Minnie. You just know her when she comes to the door. In fact, Aunt Minnie is so common that the primary website for radiologists is actually called auntminnie.com.
BLOCK: No kidding.
FRIEDMAN: Yeah.
BLOCK: Doctor Friedman is an Aunt Minnie always a bad thing - something you don't want to see on a scan?
FRIEDMAN: No. Actually, it can be something that you just want to leave alone. It might be a tumor that somebody who hasn't encountered it before might think it's cancer. But, you know, you've seen it several times and you know is a benign - what we would call a leave-me-alone lesion - something that's there. It's never going to be a problem. Just leave it alone.
BLOCK: You know, I'm wondering if Doctor Felson's actual Aunt, Aunt Minnie, had any idea that her name had become such a term of your trade.
FRIEDMAN: Well, here's the best part of the story. As it turns out, he actually did not have an Aunt Minnie. (Laughter).
BLOCK: Oh, you're kidding me. There is no Aunt Minnie?
FRIEDMAN: There is no Aunt Minnie, but it was such a wonderful term.
BLOCK: Well, Doctor Friedman thanks so much for talking to us and for telling us about Aunt Minnie in the world of radiology.
FRIEDMAN: My pleasure.
BLOCK: That's Doctor Harold Friedman, a radiologist in Deerfield, Illinois. Got some trade lingo for us? We're still collecting. We're on Twitter and Facebook @npratc. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.