Medical roots and their derivations

From WikiMD's Food, Medicine & Wellness Encyclopedia

Medical roots and their derivations are the basic elements of medical terminology. They are derived from ancient Greek or classical Latin, and have a droppable -o-. This is a list of roots, suffixes, and prefixes used in medical terminology, their meanings, and their etymology.

Roots[edit | edit source]

Medical roots generally go together according to language. Greek prefixes go with Greek suffixes and Latin prefixes with Latin suffixes. Although international scientific vocabulary is not stringent about segregating combining forms of different languages, it is advisable when coining new words not to mix different lingual roots.

Suffixes[edit | edit source]

A huge amount of medical terminology is made up of suffixes. They are attached at the end of a medical word root to add meaning such as condition, disease process, or procedure.

Prefixes[edit | edit source]

Medical terminology is used to precisely describe the human body components, processes, illnesses, medical procedures, and pharmacology. Medical terminology is used in the field of medicine, and clinical settings. This section deals with all med terms beginning with a letter, and features prefixes, suffixes and roots in medical terminology.

See also[edit | edit source]

References[edit | edit source]

Medical roots and their derivations Resources
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Contributors: Prab R. Tumpati, MD