LATIN MEDICAL TERMINOLOGY
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Introduction, contact information
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Requirements
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Structure of Latin medical terminology
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Required introductory grammar
Contact information
Mgr. Karel Černý, Ph.D.
Institution:
Ústav dějin lékařství a cizích jazyků 1. LF UK
Institute for History of Medicine and Foreign Languages 1st
Faculty of Medicine, Charles University
Address:
Kateřinská 32
120 00 Praha 2
(entrance: via foreign students office and library)
http://udl.lf1.cuni.cz/
karel.cerny@lf1.cuni.cz
Required textbook
Dana Svobodová, An Introduction to Greco-Latin Medical
Terminology, Prague (Nakladatelství Karolinum) 2002.
Available at:
 booksellers
 Wimmer (Lipová street – in vicinity of General hospital)
 Karolinum
(Celetná street, within reach of
underground stations “Můstek” or “Náměstí republiky”)

library of the faculty (Kateřinská street, foreign
students dpt.)
REQUIREMENTS FOR SUCCESSFUL
COMPLETION OF THE COURSE
Latin terminology is a one term course with obligatory
credit and exam in the end of the winter term.
Two ways of obtaining a credit:
a) if all tests during a term are successful AND the
attendance is satisfactory (two or less lessons missed):
you will receive a credit without additional conditions in
the “credit week”
b) if any of previous conditions is not met: you have to
write a credit test during the credit week (three
attempts are allowed)
Exam conditions


three attempts are allowed, the 3rd one must be with
different examinator than previous two
exam consists of two parts:
 written test
 spoken examination.
Further details about credits and exams can be found here:
http://udl.lf1.cuni.cz/
Consultations:
During the therm or the examination period available on
request.
Structure of Latin-Greek Medical
Terminology
Grammatical structure:
nouns (substantivum, divided to 5 declensions)
 adjectives
(adiectivum, two major groups, 3 declensions)
 prepositions (praepositiones)
 numerals (numeralia, cardinal and ordinal numerals)
 Greek grammar (3 declensions to limited extent)

Lexical structure:
Latin vocabulary
 Greek vocabulary
 one-word composed terms

Nouns


Nouns are divided to declensions indicated in
textbook using Roman numerals I. - V.
Every declension consist of six grammatical
cases in singular and plural. 5th and 3rd case
are not used in Medical Terminology
Names of cases:
1. nominativus (nominative)
2. genitivus (genitive/possessive case)
4. accusativus (accusative/objective case)
6. ablativus (ablative)

Adjectives, prepositions, numerals,
verbs
adjectives use the same system of cases (and
suffixes) as Latin nouns limited to I. - III.
declension
 prepositions consist of three groups and are
indeclinable
 numerals – two groups, partially indeclinable
 verbs – only imperative is required
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