Symptom
Symptom
The Art of Drowning
Category="Medical terms"Category="Symptoms"The term symptom (from the Greek syn = con/plus and pipto = fall, together meaning co-exist) has two similar meanings in the context of physical and mental health: - A symptom may loosely be said to be a physical condition which shows that one has a particular illness or disorder (see e.g. Longman, 1995). An example of a symptom in this sense of the word would be a Rash. However, correctly speaking, this is known as a sign, as would any indication detectable by a person other than the sufferer in the absence of verbal information from the Patient.
- Strictly, a symptom is a sensation or change in health function experienced by a patient. In this, medically correct, sense of the word, it is a subjective report, as opposed to a sign, which is objective evidence of the presence of a Disease or Disorder. Examples of symptoms are fatigue/tiredness, Pain, or Nausea. The symptom that leads to a diagnosis is called a cardinal symptom. In contrast, elevated blood pressure, or abnormal appearance of the Retina, would be a medical sign indicating the nature of the disease.
See also
Reference
- Longman dictionary of contemporary English (1995). Third edition.
External links
- Online Medical Symptom Checker