Prefixes and Suffixes
Chapters 2 & 3
1
Color Coding of word parts:

From now on you will see:
 all
WORD ROOTS highlighted in PURPLE
 all COMBINING VOWELS highlighted in RED
 all SUFFIXES highlighted in BLUE
 all PREFIXES highlighted in GREEN
Medical Terms that are constructed
from parts

To review, medical terms that are constructed from
parts may include:

Word Roots
Prefixes
Suffixes
One or more Combining Vowels (usually an “o” or
an “i”



Prefix: a beginning

Always attaches to the BEGINNING of a word

**IMPORTANT NOTE: The meaning of a prefix
always remains the same.
PREFIXES:
 Prefixes express:
Numbers, measurements,
position, direction,
negatives, and color
Prefixes that express
NUMBERS:
 Bi Tri-
 Uni Primi Semi-
 Tetra Quadri Milli-
6
Prefixes that express
MEASUREMENTS:
 Hyper-
 Hyp/hypo Multi Poly-
7
Prefixes that express POSITION
or DIRECTION
 Ab Ad-
 Ambi Ante Circum-
 Endo-
8
Prefixes that express
COLOR:
 albino Cyan chlor Erythr Leuk Melan/o Cirrh/o-
9
Prefixes that express
NEGATIVES:
 A An Ana Anti Contra Dis
10
Suffix: an ending
 Always attaches to the END of a word
 Makes a word a noun or an adjective
 **IMPORTANT NOTE: The meaning of a suffix
always remains the same.
Suffixes:
 Suffixes usually make a
word a:
Noun or an adjective
Let’s look at more Noun
Suffixes!
 These suffixes
Examples:
make
 words into Nouns: Cyanoderma

-a Radiographer

- Psychologist
er
Albinism

ist

ism
Suffixes- Adjective endings
 In medical terminology, suffixes are what change a
word to be an adjective (or a noun, as we saw
earlier).
 What follows next is a list of the most common
 “Adjective Suffixes”
Suffixes
–
Adjective
endings
 -ac
 -al
All of these suffixes mean the same thing:
 -ar
 -ic
 -ical
 -ile
 -ory
 -ous
 -tic
PERTAINING TO
Let’s see them used in
examples:
 -ac “cardiac” = pertaining to the heart
 -al “duodenal” = pertaining to the duodenum
 -ar “ventricular” = pertaining to the ventricle
 -ic “thoracic” = pertaining to the thorax
“neurological” = pertaining to the nerves/brain
ical “febrile” = pertaining to fever
 -ile “auditory” = pertaining to hearing
 -ory “venous” = pertaining to veins
“cyanotic” = pertaining to blueness
ous
 -tic
-
Pronunciation Practice
 Apnea
 Hemiplegia
 Intercostal
 Intravenous
 Primigravida
 Anemia
 Osteoblast
 Epilepsy
 Tonometry
Hemolytic
Autism
Arachnophobia
Lipoma
Lithotripsy
Colostomy
Dyspnea
The End