Question

How do you look up the meaning of a medical term which consists of two or more words occurring together? Underline the word you need to look up to find full information about the following? Can you always predict this? 1. Sickle cell anemia 2. Anterior fontanelle 3. Medical ethics 4. Ayurvedic medicine 5. Carpal tunnel syndrome 6. Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome / AIDS 7. Human Immunodeficiency Virus / HIV 19

please help me

Answer 1

Most of the medical terminology consists of compound words which are made up of different root words. These root words are then combined with some prefixes and suffixes. The prefixes are combined at the start of the word however, the suffixes are combined at the end of the word.

For example: The word neuroblastoma is divided into:

• Neuro: nerve
• Blast: immature cells
• Oma: tumor

Meaning of:

• Sickle cell anemia: Searching sickle·mi·a can easily bring up the information about the disease. Sickle is the root word in the compound word and it relate to the abnormal shape of the blood cells. Moreover, mia acts as the suffix that depict a condition relating to anemia or shortage of blood in the body. So after combining the word the disease can be termed as abnormal sickle shape of the red blood cells that can lead to chronic anemia.
• Anterior fontanelle: Fontanel is an anatomical characteristic of the infant’s skull in which the skull bones of the baby are not fused with each other. Anterior on the other hand is the location in front. So after combining the word anterior fontanelle can be considered as the fontanel that is located in the anterior position of the skull.
• Medical ethics: Searching for ethos can certainly bring up the information about ethics. Ethos is the root word for ethics and -ics is the suffix. Combining medical with ethics can bring up the principles and information related to medical ethics.
• Ayurvedic medicine: Ayurveda is the root word and ic is the suffix for the word. It means something made up from the science of Ayurveda. Combining medicine to the term can bring up the meaning to medicines that are made up from Ayurveda.
• Carpel tunnel syndrome: Carp is the root word depicting something pertaining to the wrist and a syndrome is any condition of abnormality. After adding the terminology carpel tunnel syndrome can be termed as a medical condition that occurs from the compression of the median nerve as it moves toward the wrist at the carpal tunnel.
• Acquired immune deficiency syndrome/ AIDS: searching for AIDS can bring up all the information related to AIDS. Moreover, the terminology itself bring up the meaning for the syndrome. It is basically an abnormality of the immune system after acquiring a virus termed as HIV.
• Human immunodeficiency virus/ HIV: Searching for HIV can bring up information about the terminology. It is basically a virus that lead to immunodeficiency in humans.