Medical Assistant Prep / Unit 2 MAS 042 worked example, 60 to 90 seconds
Taking a Word Apart
The idea
To read an unfamiliar medical word, break it into parts, define each part, and then read the meanings together.
In practice
Step one: find the suffix, because it often tells you whether the word names a condition or a procedure. In hepatomegaly, megaly means enlargement. Step two: find the root. Hepat means liver, so hepatomegaly is enlargement of the liver. Step three: look for a prefix. In tachycardia, tachy means fast and cardi means heart, so the word means a fast heart rate. Step four: put the meanings together and check that the result makes sense. Pericarditis reads as peri, around, and card, heart, with itis, inflammation, which gives inflammation around the heart.
Where people slip
Word parts give you the meaning, not the clinical picture. Knowing that a word means enlargement of the liver does not tell you why it happened or what to do, and that remains the provider's question.
Your place on the trail
Every lesson rests on earlier ones and opens later ones. Tap any to jump.
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