Where do medical words come from?
Break clinical terms into their Greek and Latin parts. Learn the roots once and you can work out unfamiliar words.
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Word roots
cardi/o heart
hepat/o liver
nephr/o kidney
dermat/o skin
oste/o bone
gastr/o stomach
neur/o nerve
haemat/o blood
All roots →
Prefixes & suffixes
hypo- under
hyper- over
tachy- fast
brady- slow
-itis inflammation
-ectomy removal
-aemia blood condition
-algia pain
All prefixes · All suffixes →
Language of origin
Most of the word parts listed here are Greek. Many reached English through New Latin, the Latin of early modern science.