71–80 of 104 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
itis = inflammation Infection can cause an itis, but not all itis is due to infection. Such as inflammatory arthritis (noninfectious) vs septic arthritis (infectious).
senioritis?
I am hijacking this thread to express my general displeasure at popular use of the word claustrophobic . "The room is very claustrophobic"?? Really? How else does the wainscoting feel today?
As a Greek, I feel the need to protest the corruption of the word cleistophobia (kleisto = closed) into claustrophobia. Claus- sounds like the root of "to cry" (e.g. clausigelos = crying laughter), so a Greek reading claustrophobia thinks of people who are afraid of crying (though the proper rendering of a word composite with that meaning would be klauthmophobia).
>From Latin claustrum (“a shut-in place”), from claudō (“I shut, close; I imprison, confine”) + -phobia. First attested in the British Medical Journal
So it's not a corruption. It's a neologism.
Cecil’s answer isn’t quite right. “ectomy” is indeed “cut it out” but the first definition he gives for “ostomy” (“cut a hole in something”) is the proper definition for “otomy”. The second “ostomy” definition is correct: creating a stoma (mouth). It’s all Greek, for real.
Actually -otomy isn't even -otomy... it's -tomy. For example Craniotomy. Cranio-tomy. cranio = κρανίο (skull) tomy = τομή (cut) And -tomy is just a cut, not cut a hole. To cut a hole you'd have to remove a part. Most of the cuts are straight lines and then the skin just opens up like a hole because of stretching. Then, -ostomy is -stomy. Nephrostomy. Nephro-stomy. Nephro = Νεφρό (Kidney) Stomy = Στόμιο (something tha…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Anatomy derives from Latin. Physiology, pathophysiology and operational terms derive from Greek.
Amusingly, the word anatomy (“dissection”) is from Greek via Latin, from the very same root that we’re discussing here. Other English terms from the Greek root for “cut”: tomography (imaging through a lot of cross-sections); entomology (study of in-sects, critters with sect-ions in their bodies); dichotomy (division into two possibilities); atom (that which cannot be divided).
X-ectomy means to cut X out. Ecto = out, tomos = cut. Appendectomy = cut out appendix. It's surgically removed from the patient, permanently.
X-ostomy means to cut open a hole in X. Stoma = hole/mouth, tomos = cut. Colostomy = cut open a hole in the colon. There's an implication that the hole will be there in the long term.
Bonus: XY anastomosis. Open X into Y, connecting them together. Ana = on/upon, stoma = hole/mouth. Ileoanal anastomosis means opening the ileum into the anus, bypassing the colon and rectum. X and Y are implied to have a lumen and the contents of X are implied to flow into Y. Lumen = light, it means a cavity, the interior space of a body structure, such as a blood vessel.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Amusingly, the word anatomy (“dissection”) is from Greek via Latin, from the very same root that we’re discussing here. Other English terms from the Greek root for “cut”: tomography (imaging through a lot of cross-sections); entomology (study of in-sects, critters with sect-ions in their bodies); dichotomy (division into two possibilities); atom (that which cannot be divided).
I was going to ask "What's an Ana and why are we cutting it?"
(Complaints about noun morphology sound a bit hypocritical from a native speaker of Russian, I know, but it is what it is.)
Cecil’s answer isn’t quite right. “ectomy” is indeed “cut it out” but the first definition he gives for “ostomy” (“cut a hole in something”) is the proper definition for “otomy”. The second “ostomy” definition is correct: creating a stoma (mouth). It’s all Greek, for real.
Actually -otomy isn't even -otomy... it's -tomy. For example Craniotomy. Cranio-tomy. cranio = κρανίο (skull) tomy = τομή (cut) And -tomy is just a cut, not cut a hole. To cut a hole you'd have to remove a part. Most of the cuts are straight lines and then the skin just opens up like a hole because of stretching. Then, -ostomy is -stomy. Nephrostomy. Nephro-stomy. Nephro = Νεφρό (Kidney) Stomy = Στόμιο (something tha…
Edit: I just did an internet search and found you use Chinese or Turkish instead. Never mind me.