Medical terms A–Z

A chemical used in photography, paper making, water treatment, and for other purposes.

One simple reaction, a sulfur atom loosely held and easily given away, explains a list of uses that otherwise looks unrelated.

A diet consisting of bland foods that are softened by cooking, mashing, pureeing, or blending.

The back, muscular (not bony) part of the roof of the mouth.

Refers to muscle, fat, fibrous tissue, blood vessels, or other supporting tissue of the body.

Soft tissue sarcoma is a rare cancer arising in muscle, fat, or connective tissue rather than in bone or organs.

A sun-damage lesion easier to feel than to see, and the visible tip of a much wider field of altered skin.

An abnormal mass of tissue that usually does not contain cysts or liquid areas.

A monoclonal antibody used to prevent red blood cells from being destroyed in patients with paroxysmal nocturnal hemoglobinuria (PNH), a red blood cell disorder.

A soluble substance dissolves in a given liquid, a property that determines how a compound is absorbed, formulated, or transported in the body.

A solvent is a liquid capable of dissolving another substance to form a uniform solution, a role relevant in pharmacy, laboratory work, and toxicology.

Somatic refers to the physical body, distinguishing bodily structures and symptoms from mental, emotional, or reproductive-cell processes.

Any of the body cells except the reproductive (germ) cells.

A DNA change acquired during life in one ordinary body cell, passed to its descendants but never to a child.

A protein made by the body that stimulates the growth of many types of cells.

A type of radionuclide scan used to find carcinoid and other types of tumors.

The pituitary's growth signal, released in bursts through the night and doing much of its work through a messenger from the liver.

Periods of drowsiness, lethargy, loss of appetite, and irritability in children following radiation therapy treatments to the head.

Sound bounces back wherever one tissue meets another, so the picture is assembled from echoes rather than from shadows.

Written so that the same task produces the same result whoever performs it, and so that anyone can later check that it did.