Lingua Medica, Everyone's Guide to Understanding Medical Terminology

Medical students, word enthusiasts and even patients will find this enlightening, mainly because medical author Brooks assumes readers have absolutely no background in Greek or Latin. He lists and explains suffixes, prefixes and roots separately and in alphabetical order so all the reader has to do is break down the fancy words and make common sense of them, piece by piece. He also lists names for body parts and functions with their English, Latin and Greek equivalents, and for true disciples has a short list of fun conditions, including those featuring a small, thick lizard head or a lung condition caused by fine dust from a volcano. Those with the gift can also use the lists to make up their own diseases or procedures, turning "bad hair" into the much more prestigious "malthricos" or something like it. Annotation ©2008 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)