Library / English Dictionary

PHYSICIAN

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

 I. (noun) 

Sense 1

Meaning:

A licensed medical practitioner

Example:

I felt so bad I went to see my doctor

Synonyms:

doc; doctor; Dr.; MD; medico; physician

Classified under:

Nouns denoting people

Hypernyms ("physician" is a kind of...):

medical man; medical practitioner (someone who practices medicine)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "physician"):

vet; veterinarian; veterinary; veterinary surgeon (a doctor who practices veterinary medicine)

operating surgeon; sawbones; surgeon (a physician who specializes in surgery)

medical specialist; specialist (practices one branch of medicine)

quack (an untrained person who pretends to be a physician and who dispenses medical advice)

primary care physician (the physician who provides primary care)

houseman; intern; interne; medical intern (an advanced student or graduate in medicine gaining supervised practical experience ('houseman' is a British term))

house physician; resident; resident physician (a physician (especially an intern) who lives in a hospital and cares for hospitalized patients under the supervision of the medical staff of the hospital)

hakeem; hakim (a Muslim physician)

general practitioner; GP (a physician who is not a specialist but treats all illnesses)

gastroenterologist (a physician who specializes in diseases of the gastrointestinal tract)

extern; medical extern (a nonresident doctor or medical student; connected with a hospital but not living there)

angiologist (a physician who specializes in angiology)

allergist (a physician skilled in the diagnosis and treatment of allergies)

abortionist (a person (who should be a doctor) who terminates pregnancies)

Instance hyponyms:

Edward Jenner; Jenner (English physician who pioneered vaccination; Jenner inoculated people with small amounts of cowpox to prevent them from getting smallpox (1749-1823))

Harry F. Klinefelter; Harry Fitch Kleinfelter; Klinefelter (United States physician who first described the XXY-syndrome (born in 1912))

Clemence Sophia Harned Lozier; Lozier (United States physician who in 1863 founded a medical school for women (1813-1888))

Manson; Sir Patrick Manson (Scottish physician who discovered that elephantiasis is spread by mosquitos and suggested that mosquitos also spread malaria (1844-1922))

Franz Anton Mesmer; Friedrich Anton Mesmer; Mesmer (Austrian physician who tried to treat diseases with a form of hypnotism (1734-1815))

Paracelsus; Philippus Aureolus Paracelsus; Theophrastus Philippus Aureolus Bombastus von Hohenheim (Swiss physician who introduced treatments of particular illnesses based on his observation and experience; he saw illness as having an external cause (rather than an imbalance of humors) and replaced traditional remedies with chemical remedies (1493-1541))

Peter Mark Roget; Roget (English physician who in retirement compiled a well-known thesaurus (1779-1869))

Ross; Sir Ronald Ross (British physician who discovered that mosquitos transmit malaria (1857-1932))

Benjamin Rush; Rush (physician and American Revolutionary leader; signer of the Declaration of Independence (1745-1813))

Albert Schweitzer; Schweitzer (French philosopher and physician and organist who spent most of his life as a medical missionary in Gabon (1875-1965))

Anna Howard Shaw; Shaw (United States physician and suffragist (1847-1919))

Simpson; Sir James Young Simpson (Scottish obstetrician and surgeon who pioneered in the use of ether and discovered the anesthetic effects of chloroform (1811-1870))

English Hippocrates; Sydenham; Thomas Sydenham (English physician (1624-1689))

E. A. von Willebrand; Erik Adolf von Willebrand; Erik von Willebrand; von Willebrand; Willebrand (Finnish physician who first described vascular hemophilia (1870-1949))

Aletta Jacobs; Jacobs (Dutch physician who opened the first birth control clinic in the world in Amsterdam (1854-1929))

George Huntington; Huntington (United States physician who first described Huntington's chorea)

Hodgkin; Thomas Hodgkin (English physician who first described Hodgkin's disease (1798-1866))

Harvey; William Harvey (English physician and scientist who described the circulation of the blood; he later proposed that all animals originate from an ovum produced by the female of the species (1578-1657))

Gilbert; William Gilbert (English court physician noted for his studies of terrestrial magnetism (1540-1603))

Etienne-Louis Arthur Fallot; Fallot (French physician who described cardiac anomalies including Fallot's tetralogy (1850-1911))

Christiaan Eijkman; Eijkman (Dutch physician who discovered that beriberi is caused by a nutritional deficiency (1858-1930))

Down; John L. H. Down (English physician who first described Down's syndrome (1828-1896))

Burrill Bernard Crohn; Crohn (United States physician who specialized in diseases of the intestines; he was the first to describe regional ileitis which is now known as Crohn's disease (1884-1983))

Bruce; David Bruce; Sir David Bruce (Australian physician and bacteriologist who described the bacterium that causes undulant fever or brucellosis (1855-1931))

Bartholin; Caspar Bartholin (Danish physician who discovered Bartholin's gland (1585-1629))

Barany; Robert Barany (Austrian physician who developed a rotational method for testing the middle ear (1876-1936))

Abu Ali al-Husain ibn Abdallah ibn Sina; Avicenna; ibn-Sina (Persian physician and influential philosopher; his interpretation of Aristotle influenced St. Thomas Aquinas; writings on medicine were important for almost 500 years (980-1037))

Abul-Walid Mohammed ibn-Ahmad Ibn-Mohammed ibn-Roshd; Averroes; ibn-Roshd (Arabian philosopher born in Spain; wrote detailed commentaries on Aristotle that were admired by the Schoolmen (1126-1198))

Holonyms ("physician" is a member of...):

doctor-patient relation (the responsibility of a physician to act in the best interests of the patient)

Credits

 Context examples: 

The procedure is associated with many adverse events and has to be performed or supervised by an experienced physician.

(Central Venous Cannula Insertion, NCI Thesaurus)

The physician responsible for the administration and medical care a patient receives.

(Attending Physician, NCI Thesaurus)

You've already slightly chilled your lungs. Besides, he is a physician and knows. He would never permit it.

(Love of Life and Other Stories, by Jack London)

The situation that occurs when an individual must visit a physician because of an adverse event.

(Adverse Event Doctor Visit, NCI Thesaurus)

Physicians in the United States have reported roughly 100 cases of disease in the past decade, half of them in 2016-17.

(Tick salivary glands can be a tool to study virus transmission and infection, National Institutes of Health)

A position, opinion or judgment reached after consideration by a physician with reference to subject.

(Physician Decision, NCI Thesaurus)

The room or rooms in which the physician and staff provide patient care.

(Physician Office, NLM, Medical Subject Headings)

He had caused the best room in the prison to be prepared for me (wretched indeed was the best); and it was he who had provided a physician and a nurse.

(Frankenstein, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley)

Women who are concerned they may not be getting enough iodine may wish to consult their physicians before making dietary changes or taking supplements.

(Iodine deficiency may reduce pregnancy chances, National Institutes of Health)

A physician assistant may take medical histories, do physical exams, take blood and urine samples, care for wounds, and give injections and immunizations.

(Physician assistant, NCI Dictionary)