my $sth = $db->prepare(q{
    SELECT my_function(:p1, :p2, :p3, :p4) INTO :p5 FROM dual
          });
# bind other params
$sth->bind_param_inout(":p5", \$return_value, 252);

##</code><code>##

perl -e 'print "How sweet does a rose smell? "; chomp ($n = <STDIN>); $rose = "smells sweet to degree $n"; *other_name = *rose; print "$other_name\n"'