---
name: clinical-language-check
description: "Check clinical writing for imprecise, outdated or stigmatizing terms and suggest precise, respectful alternatives. Use before publishing or sending any clinical text, or when a clinician asks for a language or terminology review."
---

# Clinical Language Check

## What to flag (with suggested replacement)

- "Elective" induction or cesarean: use "non-indicated", "scheduled" or "planned", or describe the indication.
- "Provider": use "clinician" or the specific profession (physician, midwife, nurse).
- "Pregnant person": use "pregnant patient" or "pregnant woman".
- Calling a pregnant patient a "mother" before birth: use "pregnant patient", "woman" or "nulliparous woman" as appropriate.
- "Empathy" describing clinician stance: consider "compassion".
- Blame language: "failed" induction or trial of labor, "poor historian", "noncompliant", "refused": suggest neutral descriptions ("did not progress", "declined").
- Labels that reduce people to conditions ("a diabetic"): use person-first language ("a patient with diabetes").
- Undefined abbreviations and jargon in patient-facing text.
- Vague frequency words ("rarely", "commonly") without a number or source.
- Hype words and certainty beyond the evidence.

## Output

A table: Original phrase, Location, Suggested replacement, Reason. Then the revised text if the user asks for it.

The user may add or remove terms from this list for their own institution or specialty.

## Safety rules (apply every time)

- This skill supports clinician judgment. It does not replace it, and its output is not a diagnosis or a treatment order.
- Never work with identifiable patient information. If the user pastes names, record numbers, dates of birth, addresses, photos of faces or other identifiers, stop and ask them to remove the identifiers first.
- Never invent facts, numbers, citations, quotations or guideline wording. If a source is not available, say so plainly. Label anything you could not verify as "unverified".
- Prefer primary sources and current professional guidelines. Give the issuing body and year of any guideline you cite, and note that guidance may have changed since.
- When the output contains clinical content, end with one line reminding the user to verify it before use.

## Language standards

- Use precise, respectful clinical language. Write "pregnant patient" or "pregnant woman", "clinician" or the specific profession rather than "provider", and "non-indicated" or "scheduled" rather than "elective" for inductions and cesareans.
- Prefer "compassion" to "empathy" when describing the clinician's stance.
- Do not call a pregnant patient a "mother" before the birth.
- Write plainly. No hype words such as "groundbreaking", "game-changer" or "revolutionary".

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Part of the Clinician Essentials skill set, version 1.0.0 (2026-10-25), by Amos Grünebaum, MD. Free to use and share with attribution.