I  was born into a partly medical family, in that my mother was once a nurse and later a matron, and my uncle Ken was a heart surgeon. This has imbued me with a genuine respect for the medical profession but also a mild skepticism for some of its achievements. As in every human calling, there are brilliant practitioners and incompetent ones. The hippocratic oath places a huge responsibility on the shoulders of all doctors and, inevitably, not all doctors can shoulder it.

In selecting 10 medical words, I’ve done my best to eschew words for obscure syndromes and involved surgical procedures – of which there are many – and focused instead on unusual words which you’re unlikely to have encountered, unless you work in the medical profession.

1. Iatrapistia: Whether you experience iatrapistia depends upon context. Iatrapistia refers to a lack of faith in the medical system and, looking at it in the broadest context, you might become iatrapistic in respect of the American medical system, because it is so economically inefficient. My brief encounters with American medical system have been positive in terms of skill and professionalism and so it’s difficult to be iatrapistic about US medical care. Nevertheless, the US health care system accounts for about 18% of the US economy, yet achieves less than in terms of general health than almost every health service in any other advanced economy, all of which are significantly less expensive. The system is clearly broken in a fundamental way.

There are undoubtedly many iatropists among the enthusiasts for ‘alternative’ medicines, based not so much on formal evidence, but the conviction that medicine needs to be holistic and western medical technology tends to be based on a specific cure for a specific condition. Alternative medical systems, particularly acupuncture, homeopathy, herbal medicine, naturopathy and chiropractice, are more holistic although whether and where they are more efficacious is a matter of heated debate.

2. Kinesipathy: Kinesipathy works. A severe attack of jogging will normally banish a cold – but it will do little for flu other than exhaust you almost instantly (in my experience). Kinesipathy is the treating illness by exercise and there is an alternative word, kinesiatrics which means much the same. This is a conventional Western medicine word, although Yoga and Tai Chi could be viewed preventive kinesipathy – since their aim is to promote health rather than cure disease. The larger term, physiotherapy, is normally used, since it embraces massage techniques as well as exercise. The word is thus rarely seen, living mostly in dictionaries and lists of obscure words, like this one.

3. Penotherapy: This is preventive medicine, referring to the control of prostitution in order diminish the spread of venereal diseases. It’s vaguely amusing that its etymology is from ‘penis’ – implying the sexist notion that all we should really care for is the protection of the world’s population of penises. Although one could argue that penises are more frequently the agents of spreading the infection. Should you doubt this, by the way, you need only consult the statistics for syphilis. They will insist that a large proportion of syphilis cases (often as high as 50 percent) are among male homosexuals. Penotherapy, on its own, will do little to address that imbalance.

4. Recrudesence: As I’ve been so bold as to mention syphilis, it’s worth noting that its one of those diseases that exhibits recrudesence. Syphilis is a disease that goes through different stages. The first stage is visible, starting with buton-like sores on the genitals, rectum or mouth. The sore will usually heal without treatment. The bacteria spreads through the body, often causing a dark red rash on almost any area of skin. This stage lasts for maybe 9 months, after which the disease goes latent. The disease can remain latent for as long as 50 years.

The final stage of syphilis is debilitating, as the bacteria attack just about any part of the body, including the skin, ligaments, bones, the nervous system, the heart and blood vessels. The outcomes include blindness, paralysis and insanity. It’s often suggested that historical figures; Hitler and Henry VIII, for example, were syphilitic, based on their crazy behavior in later life.

Syphilis was a scourge until the discovery of antibiotics, which proved to be a miracle cure.

No previous treatments were efficacious. Recrudesence, the re-emergence of the disease after an apparent cure, was the outcome. Recrudesence is also the rule with malaria, which sadly is not addressable with antibiotics, since it is caused is by parasite rather than bacteria.

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