hHey everyone! JJ, here. In this lesson, I'm going to be talking to you guys about medical terminology.
Medical terminology is like learning like a different language, and it pretty much is like a different language, but there are many easy ways to break the word apart in two different pieces to make it much easier to comprehend. The first thing I want to talk to you guys about is just breaking it down. So in a medical term, each word has a beginning, a middle and an end.
The beginning is known as the prefix and this is typically a descriptive part of the word or a description that tells you what the number or the amount is, the size, location, color etc The middle of the word is known as the root, and that's kind of like the subject of the word. It usually relates to a part of the body, and the ending of the word is called the suffix or what I like to call the condition of the word, which kind of details the process or procedure but can also tell you about the amount, the location or other things as well. So just to kind of give you guys a brief background about certain prefixes that are commonly used, one of the first ones you probably heard of is macro.
“Macro” just means large, and it typically is used in the context that it is visible to the naked eye, so you might have heard of “macroscopic”, “macroeconomy”, and the opposite of that, is “micro”, which just means small or not visible to the naked eye. And the way I like to remember this is that I think of a microscope. So some things in the world are microscopic, and other things in the world like galaxies in our observable universe, they are macroscopic.
Some other words are about amount and size. One is “hyper”. “Hyper” just means high, above normal, or elevated.
And another one, the opposite of hyper, would be “hypo”. So, that means just low, below normal, or decreased. So a couple other prefixes that you may not be aware of one is “Eu-“ or “normo-“ and that just means that it's a normal or the condition is normal.
So it could be you could be euthermic instead of hypothermic you’re euthermic so you're at a normal body temperature. Another term is “pan” or “omni” and that just means "all", so you can kind of think of “omnipotent”, all-powerful, "panorama". It's a term that kind of encompasses all of something.
Another prefix would be "a" or "an", which just means absent or lacking. The prefix "megalo" also means large or larger than average. So we'll get into some numerical prefixes.
This one's pretty easy, "mono", which just means single or singular. "Di" means 2 or double. "Try" 3 or triple.
"Quad" for 4 or quadruple. "Poly" is many or a lot and "oligo" is kind of a blanket term that just means that there are just a few, several, or very little. So for the prefixes related to speed we have "tachy", which means rapid or fast, and "brady" or "brachy", which means slow.
And so for these terms you kind of typically think of the heart - you can have tachycardia or bradycardia. So they're just different terms to describe the speed of the heart rate. So for a different location for prefixes we've got "epi", "peri", and "circum" and these all just mean around, around the location, or around the object.
So you can just think of perimeter, circumference, and with epicenter, you're kind of around the center. Now the other one is "endo" or "intra", they mean pretty much the same thing - that just means inside, inner, or interior. So for these ones you can think of intracellular or endocrine for examples.
The opposite of those ones are "exo" and "extra" so they just mean outside or outer or exterior. So we can think of exocytosis or the extracellular environment. And a term that a lot of students get confused with is inter so you can see that intra and inter are very similar.
So the difference is that "inter" means between - so for example, like the intracellular environment versus the intercellular environment, they're different meanings so just be aware of that guys. The next thing is "trans" - now with this one you can think of transmembrane or transatlantic - it just means across. The other one is "dia" or "per" so that just means through or complete.
So with "dia" you can think of diameter and with "per" you can think of perforate - it's something that goes through, so it just means going through something. The other one is "medi" or media, which just means in the middle. The next one is "para", which means nearby, and then we also have "juxta", which means next to or beside or adjacent - so I just think of juxtaposition you put things beside each other.
So the next prefixes involve movements. The first one is "AB" or "ab", which means away so when you abduct your arms, your moving your you're moving your arms away from your body or abduction, or abducting a child that's an easy way to remember AB for away. The next one is "ad" or "ad", which means towards so adducting your arms means bringing your arms inwards, towards your body that's adduction.
The next one is "dis", which means to separate, so just think of displace you're kind of separating something out or separating things. The next group of prefixes I want to talk to you guys about is colors. So the prefix for color is actually "chromo" or "chromato".
"Leuko", that means white. The next one is "erythro", which means red. "Cyano" is blue.
"Chloro" green. "Melan" or "Melano" is black, so melanoma. And the last one is one that you very rarely ever hear which is "flav", which means yellow so you guys may have heard of these before.
"Leuko" for white - leukocyte. Red blood cells or erythrocytes. "Cyano", cyanide is a word that you think of, you become hypoxic and kind of become blue - cyanosis.
Another one is "chloro", think of chlorophyll in plants that makes them look green so this is just some easy ways to remember those. Now getting into the body itself, just some general terms. One is "homeo" which just means body.
"Cephalo" is head. "Cerv" or cervical or cervical refers to the neck. "Thoraco" or thorax is the chest.
"Abdomino" is the abdomen, abdomen or abdominal. "Pelvo", or pelvi, is just pelvic or just related to your pelvis. "Periton" is just related to the peritoneum so the lining within your abdomen.
"Derm" which means skin or more specifically dermis and "neuro" for nerve and "hemo" for blood. "Arterio" or "angio" for arteries, so for arterio and angio you might have heard of angioplasty or angiograms, they all have to do with arteries. The next one is veno or vena, which is just the venous system or veins you may have heard of the inferior or superior vena cava.
So that's a way to remember them. "Vasculo" just means vascular, so your vascular system your vasculature. "Musculo" for muscle and also the related term "Sarco" for muscle so you might have heard of myocardium or sarcoplasmic reticulum they all deal with muscle or muscle cells.
Two related ones are also skelet-, in musculoskeletal system and osteo, which means bone. So they both are related to bones. Another one is "cyto" for cell and the other related term is the suffix "cyt", which means cells or cellular.
So the next organs I'm going to get into, are the neck and thoracic organs. So starting with your thyroid, which is "thyro" is the prefix for that one. "Tracheo" for trachea.
"Esophago" or "Esophageo" for the esophagus. "Thymo" for thymus which is an immune system organ that's relatively close to your heart. "Masto" or "mammo", which is related to the mammary gland or the breast.
"Pulmo" or "pneumo" for the lung. "Cardio" for the heart. The next organs I'm going to get into are the abdominal organs.
So "gastro" for the stomach. "Hepato" for the liver, so you may have heard of hepatitis or hepatocyte so they all relate to the liver. One that you may not have heard of is "cholecysto" and that's for the gallbladder, so you might not have heard of but it may be called cholecystectomy when you remove your gallbladder or cholecystokinin, which controls gall bladder contraction.
Another one is "spleno" meaning spleen -- another one is "pancreato" for the pancreas. Another one is "adreno" for the adrenal gland, the gland that sits on top of your kidneys. And you might not have heard of this one, "Nephro" for your kidney, so you can think of nephrologist, a kidney specialist.
"Nephro" actually comes from and is derived from the nephron or the functional unit within the kidney. "Entero" is used for the intestine, so you might have heard of enteritis, an inflammation of your intestines. Another one is "colo", which refers to the colon or large intestine.
So you might have heard of colitis, an inflammation of the colon. So here are some common suffixes in medical terminology. "Ology" means the "study of", like biology = the study of life; nephrology = the study of the kidney; gastroenterology = the study of the gastrointestinal system, and the list can go on and on.
It just means the study of a particular subject. The next one is "-philia", which means the love of, and the opposite of philia is "phobia", which is just the fear of so that's an easy one most people know that phobia is a fear of something. Another one that people don't think of is "tension" - tension means pressure, so hypertension = high blood pressure.
So tension just means pressure. And the suffix -xia it's kind of hard to say this, but things like hypoxia. Xia is oxygen (condition of oxygen), it has to do with oxygen.
Hypoxia is low oxygen. Another gas that we want to be aware of is carbon dioxide, and that is the suffix "-capnea". So you can think of hypercapnia, high carbon dioxide levels.
So the next one is if "-pnea" this is another hard one to say, that just means "air" so it's related to "pneumo" it's spell this kind of the same way with a "P" and you have that "PN" there, so it's an odd spelling. So it's actually it "nea" so you might have heard of dyspnea or "hyperpnea", different things like that have to do with air or breathing.
