Medical Terminology

ENG 201

Chapter-1
Basic Word Structure

2019-20
 Learning outcomes
By the end of the lecture student will be able to:
• Identify the basic objectives to guide your study of the medical
language
• Understand the components of the medical terms
• Recognize the meanings of basic combining forms, suffixes and
prefixes of the medical language.
• Build basic medical terms using prefixes, suffixes, root words, and
combining forms
• Divide, analyze, define and pronounce complex medical words by
recognizing their components: prefixes, suffixes, combining forms,
and root words.
• Learn the common rules for proper medical term formation,
pronunciation, and spelling.
What is Medical Terminology?

• Language of health care professionals

• Terms used to describe structures, organs, systems, functions,

procedures, situations, disorders, objects etc.

• Medical terms are mostly derived from Latin & Greek

 Why you need to study the
medical language

• The health care workers and related people use medical terms
to communicate

• Medical literature uses the medical language / terms

• It is a sort of global medical language

• Knowing the rules applied in making a medical term helps you

to interpret the long and difficult term.
 Let’s Begin………..
• Can you define Electroencephalogram ?
• Can you tell the difference between Electroencephalogram and
Electrocardiogram?

If you break the term into parts and define the meaning of each
part, it will be a lot easier!!!!!
How can we make it easier?
Breaking the Term into parts is the key!!!!

• No need to memorize whole terms

• Divide the term into component parts
• Learn how to combine word parts
• Write terms down
• Label diagrams
• Visualize images
• Practice pronunciation

It is impossible to memorize all of the thousands of medical

terms
Important elements of medical terms

• Root: foundation of the term

• Suffix: word ending
• Prefix: word beginning
• Combing vowel: vowel usually (O) that links the root to the
suffix or the root to another root.
• Combining form: combination of the root and the combining
vowel.

Always read meaning of medical terms starting from suffix

back to beginning of the term e.g.

“Endometritis” Inflammation of the endometrium of Uterus

 Root
• Contains the meaning of the word
• Frequently indicates a body part
e.g. Hemat means Blood
• Or may be an action
e.g. Cis means to cut
• Word roots are usually derived from Greek or Latin

Greek word Word Root

Kardia (heart) Cardi
Gaster (stomach) Gastr
Hepar (liver) Hepat
Osteon (bone) Oste
 Root
• Medical terms usually have one or more roots e.g.
• In the term gastroenterology, “gastr” and “enter” are
roots
• Some medical terms are built without a word root e.g.
• Hyper = Prefix meaning excessive
• Trophy = Suffix meaning development
• Hypertrophy = Excessive development
• A single word root cannot stand alone
• A suffix and a combining vowel must be added to complete
the term e.g.
• Hematology – process of study of blood

Root Vowel Suffix

 Combining Vowel/FORMS

• To make a medical term easier to pronounce, a combining

vowel is added to combine two word parts
• Between two word roots
• Between word root and suffix
• Combing vowel is most commonly the letter ‘o’
• A word root with a combining vowel is called a Combining
Form
• e.g. cardi/o = cardio
• hemat/o = Hemato (combining form)

Root Vowel
 Combining Vowel/Forms
Between word root and suffix:
• If the suffix begins with a vowel (a,e,i,o,u), Do not use a
combining vowel
e.g. Gastr/o + itis = Gastritis , not gastroitis

• If the suffix begins with a consonant, use a combining

vowel
e.g. Enter/o + pathy = Enteropathy not enterpathy

• When two roots are there in a term, the combining vowel

is kept between two word roots, even if the second root
begins with a vowel (a,e,i,o,u)
e.g.Gastr/o/ enter/ o/ logy = Gastroenterology
(not Gastrenterology)
 Basic Combining forms
Combining Form Meaning
aden/o gland
arthr/o joint
bi/ o life
carcin/ o cancerous, cancer
cardi/ o heart
cephal/ o head
cerebr/o cerebrum
cis/ o to cut
crin/ o to secrete
cyst/ o bladder
cyt/o cell
 Basic Combining forms
Combining Form Meaning
derm/o, dermat/o skin
electr/o electricity
encephal/o brain
enter/o intestines (small)
erythr/o red
gastr/o stomach
gnos/o knowledge
gynec/o woman, female
hemat/o, hem/o blood
hepat/o liver
iatr/o treatment, physician
 Basic Combining forms
Combining Form Meaning
leuk/o white
log/o study of
nephr/o kidney
neur/o nerve
onc/o tumor
ophthalm/o eye
oste/o bone
path/o disease
ped/o child
psych/o mind
radi/o x-ray
 Basic Combining forms

Combining Form Meaning

ren/o kidney
rhin/o nose
sarc/o flesh
sect/o to cut
thromb/o clot, clotting
ur/o urinary tract, urine
 Suffixes

• A suffix comes at the end of a word

• Suffixes usually, but not always, indicate a procedure, a
condition, a disorder or a disease
• A suffix is always added after a word root to complete the
term e.g. neur/o means nerves
• neural means pertaining to nerves
• neuralgia is pain in the nerves

• Remember…. read the meaning of the term from the suffix

back to the beginning of term!!!
 Basic Suffixes
SUFFIX MEANING
-ac Pertaining to
-al Pertaining to
-algia pain
-cyte cell
-ectomy Excision, removal
-emia Blood condition
-genic Pertaining to producing
-globin protein
-gram record
-ic, -ical Pertaining to
-ion process
 Basic Suffixes
SUFFIX MEANING
-ist specialist
-itis inflammation
-logy Process of study
-oma tumor
-opsy Process of viewing
-osis Condition, usually abnormal
-pathy Disease condition
-scope Instrument to visually examine
-scopy Process of visually examine
-sis State of condition
-tomy Process of cutting
 Prefixes
• A prefix comes to the beginning of the term

• Can have an important influence on the meaning of the term

• Usually indicate a number, measurement, position/direction,

color or status

• Not all medical terms contain prefixes

• e.g.:
• Subgastric means pertaining to under stomach
• Epigastric means pertaining to above the stomach
 Basic Prefix
Prefix Meaning
a- no, not, without
an- no, not, without
aut- self, own
auto- self, own
dia through, complete
endo- in, within, inside
epi- upon, above
ex- out
exo- outside of, outward
hypo- below, deficient, under, less than normal
hyper- excessive, above,more than normal
 Basic Prefix
Prefix Meaning
in- into, in
peri- surrounding, around
pro- before, forward
re- back, backward, again
retro- behind
sub- below, under
trans- across, through
Determining the meaning of Terms
• If you know the meaning of word parts you can guess the
meaning of the whole term

• First, define the suffix

• Second, define the prefix
• Third, define the word root (s)

• Transhepatic: pertaining to across the liver

• Hypoglycemia: blood condition of low sugar

Determining the meaning of Terms
• Carcinogenic: (cancer) pertaining to a condition that
produces cancer
• Pathogenic : (disease) pertaining to producing disease
• Iatrogenic : (treatment) pertaining to a side effect or
condition that results from a specific treatment
• Erythrocyte: red blood cell
• Leukocyte: white blood cell
• Thrombocyte: a clotting cell/platelet
• Excision: the process of cutting out
• Incision: the process of cutting into
Determining the meaning of Terms
• Hematology: process of study of blood
• Endocrinology: the study of endocrine glands
• Gastroenterology: process of study of stomach & intestines
• Hepatoma: tumor of liver (hepatocellular carcinoma)
• Carcinoma: cancerous tumor of epithelial cells/tissues (cover
the outside of the body and line organs, cavities and tubes)
• Sarcoma: cancerous tumor of connective tissue
• Hematoma: mass or collection of blood
Determining the meaning of Terms
• Epidermis: this is outermost layer of the skin
• Hyperthyroidism: a condition in which there is increase level
of thyroid hormone
• Pericardium: it is a membrane that surrounds the heart.
• Prostate: this exocrine glands “stands” (-state) before or in
front of the male urinary bladder.
• Resection: this is an operation in which the tissue is cut back
or removed.
 Points to remember
• Some words have more than one accepted spellings e.g.:
Orthopedic (American) and Orthopaedic (British)

• Some combining forms have the different origins but same

meaning. There are 3 combining forms that mean uterus
hyster/o ,metri/o, uter/o.

• some combining forms have same sound with different

meaning, like ather/o means fatty e.g. atherosclerosis
(hardening of vessel walls due to fatty deposits) and arthr/o
means joint e.g arthralgia (pain in a joint)
 Points to remember
• Some terms have same sound with different meaning e.g.
Ileum means part of the small intestine Ilium means part of
the hip bone.

• Sometime same sound spelled differently e.g. psy

(psychiatry) and cy (cytology).
 Useful for pronunciations
• C (before a,o,u) = k e.g. cavity, Colon, cure

• C (before e, i) = s e.g. Cephalic, Cirrhosis

• Ch (sometimes) = k e.g. Cholesterol

• g (before a,o,u) = g Gallbladder,

Laryngology, Fungus

• g (before e,i) = j Laryngitis, Genetics,

giant
 Useful for pronunciations

ph = f phase
pn = n Pneumonia
ps = s Psychology
rh = r Rhythm, Rhinitis
rrh = r Hemorrhoid
x (as 1st letter) = z Xeroderma
THANK YOU