Learn Medical Terminology

One question I often get asked is How do you Learn Medical Terminology?

The truth it's not all that difficult to learn medical terminology.  Once you learn the basic structure of putting together medical prefixes and suffixes all you really need to do is practice and memorize.

Each medical term consist of a prefix (beginning of a word) and suffix (ending of a word).  Sometimes but not always these prefixes and suffixes are connected with the vowel "O" to make the combining form.

Here's an example:

The medical term is "afebrile"

The prefix is "a" and the suffix is "febrile"

The prefix "a" means without or absent

The suffix "febrile" means fever or temperature

Put the prefix and suffix together to make the term "afebrile" which means without a temperature.

The patient is afebrile and reactive to light and sound. = The patient doesn't have a temperature and reacts to light and sound.

That's all there is to it and once you memorize the different prefixes and suffixes it's easy to learn the meanings of many different medical terms.

Here's another example:

The medical term is "cardiomegaly"

The prefix is "cardio" the suffix is "megaly"

The prefix "cardio" means heart

The suffix "megaly" means enlarged

When combine you have the term "cardiomegaly" which basically means enlarged heart.

The patient has cardiomegaly, breath sounds are clear. = The patient has an enlarged heart and breath sounds are clear.

One more point to make is in medical transcription you don't actually translate the terms you simply transcribe them as you hear them.  The reason you need to learn medical terminology is to have a grasp of what the physician is referring to and to avoid common mistakes.