Grasping medical terminology starts with knowing the body’s systems, recognizing medical root words commonly used, understanding the Greek influence in medical terminology, and learning those pesky hard-to-spell medical words.Your Body’s SystemsYour body is made up of many systems, each having their own vital parts that work together.

What makes up the inside of your body, from cells to organs and everything in between, lends itself to an abundance of body part-related medical terms. All the root words and combining forms can morph into all kinds of different words that explain everything from everyday common conditions and procedures to pathology and pharmacology.

The urinary system is made up of the kidneys (you have two), ureters (also two), bladder, and urethra (one). This system’s main function is to remove urea, the waste product of metabolism, from the bloodstream and excrete the urea (in the urine) from the body.So, how does that big steak dinner you ate last night turn into the next morning’s output in the form of urine?

The musculoskeletal system is made up of muscles and joints. The muscles — all 600 of them and more — are responsible for movement. The skeleton provides attachment points and support for muscles, but it’s the muscle tissue’s ability to extend and contract that makes movement happen. So, for every climb of the elliptical machine, you can thank muscular tissue for making it possible.

Body parts and their accompanying medical terms don’t make a whole lot of sense until you can put them in the context of their general location within the body. Your body can be defined in several different ways, from groups and regions to cavities and planes.Body regions are used to specifically identify a body area.

Your skin (the body’s largest organ), glands, nails, and hair — also known as the integumentary system — serve as the “public face” of your body. Consider it your marketing team, letting the world know by their condition how healthy the rest of your body is. Healthy skin, along with accessory organs glands, hair, and nails, are the hallmarks of healthy insides, so care for them accordingly.

Although bones, muscles, joints, ligaments, and tendons all work together, they each have a special job. Bones provide the framework for your body but ligaments and tendons provide the attachments for muscles to contract and relax.Bones store mineral salts, and the inner core of a bone is composed of hematopoietic (blood cell–forming) red bone marrow.

Once you know the specific parts of the cardiovascular and lymphatic systems a bit better, it’s time to put your medical terminology expertise into practice. Here’s a list of cardio roots, prefixes, and suffixes. It also gives an example medical term for each. Root Word What It Means Example Aort/o Aorta Aortic Angi/o Vessel Angiogram Arteri/o Artery Arteriosclerosis Arteriol/o Arteriole Arteriolitis Ather/o Yellow plaque or fatty substance Atherosclerosis Atri/o, atri/a Atrium Atrioventricular Cardi/o Heart Cardiomegaly Coron/o Heart Coronary Ox/o, ox/i Oxygen Oximeter Phleb/o Vein Phlebitis Pulmon/o Lung Pulmonary Scler/o Hardening Sclerotherapy Thromb/o Clot Thrombus Valv/o, valvul/o Valve Valvular Vas/o Vessel Vasoconstriction Ven/o Vein Venotomy Venul/o Venule Venulitis Ventricul/o Ventricle Ventricular Prefix or Suffix What It Means Example Brady Slow Bradycardia Tachy Fast Tachycardia -graph Instrument used to record Electrocardiograph -graphy Process of recording Electrocardiography -gram Picture or finished record Electrocardiogram Check out this list of lymphatic roots and suffixes.