bedpan
Americannoun
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a shallow vessel placed under a bedridden patient to collect faeces and urine
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another name for warming pan
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of bedpan
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
Among the new finds are an anchor, glass bottles and a bedpan, according to a statement from the Colombian Institute of Anthropology and History.
From BBC ● Aug. 9, 2024
She reserved her deepest attention for the orderlies who came in to change her bedpan and her sheets.
From Slate ● Jun. 4, 2023
“Susan wanted to crawl under the nearest bedpan and hide,” he wrote.
From New York Times ● Apr. 18, 2023
Nursing notes show that Burrell was placed on a bedpan.
From Salon ● Sep. 7, 2022
If she neglected to check that hollow bedpan handles were cleaned and dry she would be in deeper trouble with the sister.
From "Atonement" by Ian McEwan
Even as the labor market has softened, healthcare jobs have stayed plentiful: People spend on healthcare in good times and bad, and thus far, the ability to change bedpans and insert IVs hasn’t been automated.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 12, 2025
Some describe the closeness they have with the people whose bedpans they change, whose medications they administer.
From New York Times ● Jun. 13, 2023
Their colleague Norman Heatley rigged up a crazy-looking Heath Robinson system involving milk churns, baths, ceramic bedpans commissioned from a local pottery company, rubber tubes, drinks bottles and a doorbell.
From BBC ● Mar. 5, 2017
I was the lowest form of nurse, taking the bedpans, and I met a kind of different person than I had before.
From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 10, 2016
The students scoured, wiped and dried bedpans and bottles till they shone like dinner plates.
From "Atonement" by Ian McEwan
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
