ACQUIRING MEDICAL LANGUAGE COMPREHENSIVE MEDICAL TERMINOLOGY STUDY GUIDE 2026

ACQUIRING MEDICAL LANGUAGE
COMPREHENSIVE MEDICAL TERMINOLOGY
STUDY GUIDE 2026

◉ Where did medical language come from?
Answer: Primarily from two ancient languages:
Greek and Latin


◉ Eponyms
Answer: Named after person who discovered or invented something
(Lou Gehrig's disease)


◉ Acronyms
Answer: Made up of the first letters of each of the words that make
up a phrase (MRI)


◉ Symbol Emphasis
Answer: Knowing where to put the correct punctuation. Placing on
correct syllable- cardiac: KAR-dee-ak


◉ Don't think of medical language as words to be memorized ...

,Answer: Instead, think of medical language as sentences to be
translated


◉ Combining vowel
Answer: The vowel used to combine two word roots or a word root
and suffix (usually the letter "o")


◉ Root: arthr/o
Answer: joint


◉ Root: cardi/o
Answer: heart


◉ Root: enter/o
Answer: small intestine


◉ Root: gastr/o
Answer: stomach


◉ Root: hepat/o
Answer: liver

, ◉ Root: neur/o
Answer: nerve


◉ Root: hem/o or hemat/o
Answer: blood


◉ Root: my/o or muscul/o
Answer: muscle


◉ Root: angi/o or vas/o or vascul/o
Answer: vessel


◉ Root: derm/o or dermat/o or cutane/o
Answer: skin


◉ Root: pneum/o or pneumon/o or pulmon/o
Answer: lung


◉ Root: gen/o
Answer: creation, cause


◉ Root: hydro/o