THE CLINICAL TERMINOLOGY

The terminology of the modern medicine is the most complicated terminological

system of the modern science. The total amount of medical terms remains unknown,
but its estimated amount exceeds one million terms. You realize that it is impossible
to learn one million words, even for an intelligent person, because we use in our
native language only several thousands words. Our course will help you to
understand and use about fifty thousand main medical terms.

This course teaches you how medical terms are ‘built’ or ‘put together’ instead of just
memorizing lots of medical words and their meanings. You will learn to recognize the
meaning of a medical term by dividing the word into its three basic component parts:
the prefix, root and suffix.

By knowing the meanings of the prefixes, suffixes, and root words, you can easily
figure out the meaning of a medical term.

For example, if you see a medical term containing the root word ‘cardi’ and the
suffix ‘itis’, you know that the term has to do with an ‘inflamed’ (itis) ‘heart’
(cardi).

Greek and Latin medical terms can be broken down into one or more word parts.
For simplicity in explanation, let's say that there are four possible word parts, and any
given medical term may contain one, some, or all of these parts:

1. root terminological elements (a shorthand notation “root”)

2. final terminological elements (a shorthand notation “suffixes”)
3. prefixes

In order to build clinical terminology you need to memorize 4 important rules:

1. If the term ends in a vowel and another starts in a consonant we join them with o
Angi + o + logia = Angiologia the study of blood vessels

2. If the term ends in a consonant and another starts in a consonant we join them with
o
Hepat+o+megalia = hepatomegalia enlargement of the liver

3. If the term ends in a consonant and another starts in a vowel we join them in a
simple way

Gastr +ectomia = gastrectomia removal of the stomac

4. If the term ends in a vowel and another starts in a vowel we join them in a simple
way
Angi+ ectomia = angiectomia the removal of blood vessel
Task:
1. To study the words (roots and suffixes) from the tables from
pages 90-91, pages 95-96, pages 99-100
2. Exercises from 1 to 5 pages 91 -93
Exercises from 1 to 5 pages 96-98
Exercises from 1 to 5 pages 101-102