50 Complex Medical Terms for Everyday Moments
Scroll below for an exhaustive list of healthcare terminology translated into everyday people-speak!
- Anosognosia : inability to recognize a defect or disorder that is clinically evident
- Anxiogenic : producing anxiety
- Aphthous stomatitis : canker sores
- Borborygmi : stomach growling
- Bradykinesia : having slow movement or reflexes
- Bruxism : teeth grinding
- Cardialgia : heartburn; pain in the heart
- Cardiovalvulitis : inflammation of heart valves
- Cerumen : earwax
- Choledocholithiasis : stones in the gallbladder or common bile duct
- Conjunctivitis : pink eye
- Costochondritis : chest pain caused by the inflammation of the cartilage that connects the ribs to the breastbone
- Crepitus : cracking your joints
- Dysphagia : difficulty swallowing
- Dyspnea : shortness of breath
- Enuresis : peeing yourself; nocturnal enuresis if you wet the bed at night and diurnal enuresis if you have involuntary urination during the day
- Epistaxis : nosebleed
- Fasciculation : muscle twitch
- Formication : the feeling that small insects are crawling on (or under) the skin when there is nothing there
- Gossypiboma : an object accidentally left inside of a patient after surgery
- Gustatory Rhinitis : runny nose from spicy food
- Heloma : having a callus on your foot; heloma molle if it’s soft, and heloma durum if it’s hard
- Horripilation : goosebumps
- Hyperhidrosis : excessive exercise
- Lachrymation : crying or having tears
- Levator Labii Superioris Alaeque Nasi : a muscle in your face that widens the nostrils and elevates the upper lip, thus allowing you to "snarl"
- Medial Tibial Stress Syndrome : shin splints
- Morsicato Buccarum : cheek biting; repetitive chewing, biting, or nibbling the inside of your cheek
- Muscae Volitantes : having “eye floaters”; little transparent threads that you see floating across your eyeball that are just little bits of protein in your eye
- Obdormition : when a limb falls “asleep”
- Onychocryptosis : ingrown toenail
- Oophorohysterectomy : surgical removal of ovary and uterus
- Orthostatic Hypotension : getting dizzy from standing up too fast
- Paresthesia : tingling or prickling of the skin, also known as “pins and needles” or a limb “falling asleep”
- Photalgia : when your eyes hurt whenever you step outside because it’s too bright; light-induced pain of the irises
- Pneumoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis : lung disease from inhaling very fine ash and sand (or “silica dust”); also known as silicosis or the black lung
- Procidentia : the descent of any internal organ (prolapse)
- Proctalgia : literal pain in the butt
- Prosopagnosia : inability to recognize faces
- Pyrexia : fever
- Rhinorrhea : runny nose
- Sphenopalatine Ganglioneuralgia : brain freeze; having a headache from ice cream
- Sternutate : sneeze
- Synchronous Diaphragmatic Flutter: hiccup; also known as myoclonic twitches
- Transient Lingual Papillitis: “lie bumps”; swollen taste bud on your tongue
- Transient Diaphragmatic Spasm: getting the wind knocked out of you
- Trichotillomania: hair pulling
- Vasovagal Syncope : fainting
- Veisalgia : hangover
- Xerosis : dry skin
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