Latin (and some Greek) is at the core of medical terminology. Put on your toga and let’s dive in.
Some language fiddlybits to kind of be aware of here. There are prefixes, that might start a word; suffixes, that end a word; and then roots, the stuff in the middle and what it’s all about. That’s what lets you make words like centennial: cent, a hundred; ennia, year, and al, pertaining to. We’d be describing something that’s a hundred years old. You’ll also see plurals for stuff: amoeba becomes amoebae, stratus becomes strata, and octopus becomes… I’m not engaging in that fight.
Some of my Latin roots might be missing an “/o” for clarity, or I might have an interpretation that isn’t exact, but I think you’ll get the general idea. Some elements can also have a couple different meanings, so I picked the ones that make sense to me. You might end up taking a class just to learn a lot of Latin medical terms, but I think it’s good to start early. It helped me, anyway!
Just a few teeny tiny examples:
- epi – outside, top (EPIDERMIS = outer-skin)
- peri – around (PERIMETER = around-measure)
- endo – within, inside (ENDOCRINE = inside-secrete
I think these three are the most recurring in anatomy. Every kind of tube or organ you see will have different layers. I’ll use the example of ice cream for a second. I prefer my ice cream tricacaotous.
Epicacao would be the chocolate syrup; pericacao might be some chocolate sprinkles; and endocacao is the ice cream underneath it all that you can’t see.
- phil – love (BIBLIOPHILE = book-lover)
- phob – fear (ACROPHOBE = height-fearer)
- hypo – low (HYPOTHERMIA = low-heat)
- hyper – high (HYPERACTIVE = high-activity)
- micro – small
- macro (or megalo) – large
And now for some organs and organ systems.
- myo – muscle
- pleuro – lung
- osteo – bone
- hemo – blood
- cerebro – brain, skull
- gastro – stomach
- hepato – liver
- gonado – genital
* Technically, “gonado-” refers to sex glands like the ovaries and testes, but the “g” in genital helps me remember.
More prefixes, because epi- and its friends are not enough!
- ab – away from (ABDUCT)
- ad – toward (ADHERE)
- de – from, without (DEODORANT)
- dis – apart (DISMANTLE)
…and so much more!
Take a close look at words and they are easier to recall! –CNx