# Inotropic, domotropic



## xrsm002 (Jul 18, 2013)

Inotropic, domotropic etc, easy way to remember these?


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## sir.shocksalot (Jul 18, 2013)

xrsm002 said:


> Inotropic, domotropic etc, easy way to remember these?



There is no easy way to remember things, only the way that works for you.

For me I remembered them with this little mnemonic:

Inotrope - iron
Think iron is strong so strength of contraction.

Chronotrope - chronos, clock
Think time, speed, rate of contraction.

Dromotrope - drum
I think of people marching at the speed of the drum beat. This works like the AV nodal conduction speed, where the AV node is the drummer. As the drum beat increases the rate picks up.

This is what works best for me to remember. My brain is a strange place but if you like this mnemonic use it, or get some inspiration for your own.


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## STXmedic (Jul 18, 2013)

Inotropy: how hard the muscle goes _in_ (contractile force)

Chronotropy: speed. Like a stopwatch (many watches show "chrono" for stopwatch)

Dromotropy is just the one that's left over (conduction velocity)


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## Rockin2climb (Nov 10, 2018)

Thanks for these. Studying for my medic test and these will help!


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## E tank (Nov 10, 2018)

STXmedic said:


> Inotropy: how hard the muscle goes _in_ (contractile force)
> 
> Chronotropy: speed. Like a stopwatch (many watches show "chrono" for stopwatch)
> 
> Dromotropy is just the one that's left over (conduction velocity)



But what about lusitropy and bathmotropy? See, the problem with using these terms in writing tests is that people writing the questions are out of their depth as much as the test takers. A positive inotrope can be a chronotrope, inotrope and dromotrope. These terms imply that these characteristics are isolated to specific drugs and that's where the confusion comes in. Combine that with omitting the qualifiers "positive" and "negative" and you end up with the situation where epinepherine and metoprolol for the purposes of test taking are both dromotropes yet are antagonists of one another.

The solution? Know what the agents do and how they do it. To know that cold, you need to know the autonomic nervous system cold first. The rest will come very easily.


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## SpookyDoDo (Nov 18, 2020)

xrsm002 said:


> Inotropic, domotropic etc, easy way to remember these?


Chronotropic - Chronos, Time

Inotropic - Ino sounds close to Iron, strength

Dromotropic - Drom sounds like Ohm, the law of electrical resistance and Conductance


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