Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
Definition: Abscess |
AbscessNoun1. Symptom consisting of a localized collection of pus surrounded by inflamed tissue. Source: WordNet 1.7.1 Copyright © 2001 by Princeton University. All rights reserved. |
Date "abscess" was first used: 1543. (references) |
Etymology: Abscess \Ab"scess\, noun; plural Abscesses. [Latin expression abscessus going away, gathering of humors, abscess, from abscessus, past participle of absedere to go away; ab, abs cedere to go off, retire. See Cede.]. (Websters 1913) |
| Domain | Definitions |
Dream Interpretation | To dream that you have an abscess which seems to have reached a chronic stage, you will be overwhelmed with misfortune of your own; at the same time your deepest sympathies will be enlisted for the sorrows of others. Source: Ten Thousand Dreams Interpreted .... |
Health | Accumulation of purulent material in tissues, organs, or circumscribed spaces, usually associated with signs of infection. (references) |
Medicine | A localized, circumscribed collection of pus. Source: European Union. (references) |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
(From Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia)
The organisms or foreign materials that gain access to a part of tissue kill the local cells, release toxins and trigger an inflammatory response by drawing huge amounts of white blood cells to the area and increasing the regional blood flow. So, pus is a collection of local dead tissue cells, white blood cells, infecting organisms or foreign material and toxins released by both organisms and blood cells. The final structure of the abscess is an abscess wall that is formed by the adjacent healthy cells in an attempt to build a barrier around the pus that limits the infected material from neighbouring structures.
The cardinal symptoms and signs of any kind of inflammatory process are redness, heat, swelling and pain. Abscesses may occur in any kind of solid tissue but most frequently on skin surface, in the lungs, brain, kidneys and tonsils. Major complications are spreading of the abscess material to adjacent or remote tissues and extensive regional tissue death (gangrene).
The treatment of first choice is the surgical drainage of the inclusives of the abscess. However, surgery may be used as a last choice in a critical location such as the brain. Moreover, the drainage of the lung abscess may be performed by giving the patient a certain position that enables the contents to be discharged via the respiratory tract. Additionally antibiotics are used to control the infection. Warm compresses and elevation of the limb may be beneficial for skin abscess.
An anal abscess is a particularly irksome variation and is often associated with the onset of diabetes if in later life. For more information regarding the surgery required and post operative care see http://johnnyspring.tripod.com/johnnyspangles/id19.html
Source: adapted by the editor from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia under a copyleft GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) from the article "Abscess."
| Context | Synonyms within Context (source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus). |
Disease | Sore, ulcer, abscess, fester, boil; pimple, wen; (swelling); carbuncle, gathering, imposthume, peccant humor, issue; rot, canker, cold sore, fever sore; cancer, carcinoma, leukemia, neoplastic disease, malignancy, tumor; caries, mortification, corruption, gangrene, sphacelus, sphacelation, leprosy; eruption, rash, breaking out. |
| Source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus. | |
Crosswords: Abscess |
| English words defined with "abscess": abscessed tooth, Abscesses, Abscession, Apostemate, Aposteme ♦ gumboil ♦ head ♦ Imposthumate, Imposthumation, Imposthume, Indigested ♦ Moro ♦ Oncotomy ♦ peritonsillar abscess, Poll evil, pyaemia, pyemia ♦ Quittor ♦ staphylococcal infection ♦ Thecal ♦ Vomica ♦ warble, Worm abscess. (references) |
| Specialty definitions using "abscess": Anal Fistula ♦ Brucella suis infection ♦ contagious abortion of sows ♦ Diverticulitis, Colonic, Drainage, Postural ♦ Entamoebiasis ♦ fistulas ♦ Liver Abscess, Amebic ♦ Periapical Periodontitis, Periodontal Abscess, porcine brucellosis, Psoas Abscess, Psoas Muscles ♦ septal abscess, swine brucellosis. (references) |
| Etymologies containing "abscess": Abscession. (references) |
| Non-English Usage: "Abscess" is also a word in the following language with the English translation in parentheses. Swedish (abscess). |
| Domain | Usage | |
Screenplays | He won't care if it's got four crossed molars on a ruptured abscess. (A Bit of a Do; writing credit: David Nobbs) | |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | ||
| Domain | Title |
Books | |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| Subject | Topic | Quote |
Health | If the condition gets worse, an abscess may form in the colon. (references) | |
Rarely, E. histolytica invades the liver and forms an abscess. (references) | ||
If symptoms continue or if an abscess does not resolve, surgery may be needed. (references) | ||
Source: compiled by the editor from ICON Group International, Inc.; see credits. | ||
| "Abscess" is generally used as a noun (singular) -- approximately 97.67% of the time. "Abscess" is used about 43 times out of a sample of 100 million words spoken or written in English. Its rank is based on over 700,000 words used in the English language. Some parts-of-speech are not covered due to the samples used by the British National Corpus. (note: percents less than one-hundredth of one percent have been omitted) |
| Parts of Speech | Percent | Usage per 100 Million Words | Rank in English |
| Noun (singular) | 97.67% | 42 | 52,864 |
| Lexical Verb (base form) | 2.33% | 1 | 339,140 |
| Total | 100.00% | 43 | N/A |
Source: compiled by the editor from several corpora; see credits.
Expressions using "abscess": Abdominal Abscess ♦ Brain Abscess ♦ Cold abscess ♦ Epidural Abscess ♦ Liver Abscess ♦ Lung Abscess ♦ mammary abscess ♦ Periapical Abscess ♦ Periodontal Abscess ♦ peritonsillar abscess ♦ Psoas Abscess ♦ Retropharyngeal Abscess ♦ septal abscess ♦ stercoraceous abscess ♦ Subphrenic Abscess ♦ worm abscess. Additional references. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. |
| The following statistics estimate the number of searches per day across the major English-language search engines as identified by various trade publications. Hyperlinks lead to commercial use of the expression at Amazon.com. |
| Expression | Frequency per Day |
abscess | 242 |
tooth abscess | 207 |
dental abscess | 40 |
peritonsillar abscess | 28 |
perianal abscess | 22 |
brain abscess | 21 |
breast abscess | 19 |
perirectal abscess | 18 |
skin abscess | 17 |
anal abscess | 17 |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| Language | Translations for "abscess"; alternative meanings/domain in parentheses. | |
Afrikaan | abses. (various references) | |
Albanian | lungë (boil, carbuncle, swelling, warble), formoj lungë. (various references) | |
Arabic | خراجة, خراج (furuncle, gathering, growth). (various references) | |
Bulgarian | шупла в метал, гнойно възпаление, загнояване (purulence), абсцес (gathering). (various references) | |
Chinese | "肿 (Abscesses). (various references) | |
Czech | absces, hlíza (tuber), bolák (sore). (various references) | |
Danish | absces. (various references) | |
Dutch | etterbuil, abces, ettergezwel. (various references) | |
Esperanto | absceso, abceso. (various references) | |
Faeroese | svullur (sore, tumor, tumour, ulcer). (various references) | |
Farsi | ماده (Article, Clause, Material, Metal, Paragraph, Point, Provision, Res, Stuff, Substance, Woman), ورم چرکی , ابسه , دمل (Blotch, Boil, Wen), دنبل . (various references) | |
Finnish | ajos, paise (anthrax, boil, charbon, milzbrand, splenic fever). (various references) | |
French | abcès. (various references) | |
Frisian | swolm. (various references) | |
German | Abszess, Abszeß. (various references) | |
Greek | απόστημα. (various references) | |
Hebrew | מו'ל" (discharge, purulence, pus), מורס" (fistula). (various references) | |
Hungarian | tályog (ulcer), kelés (blotch, boil, carbuncle, fester, job's comforter). (various references) | |
Icelandic | ígerð. (various references) | |
Indonesian | absis (abscissa), abses, bisul (blaim, blotch, boil, carbuncle, gall, protuberance, pustule), bernanah (purulent, suppurate), bengkak bernanah. (various references) | |
Italian | ascesso. (various references) | |
Japanese Kanji | 膿瘍 (boil), 出来物 (able man, boil, fine man, growth, pimple, rash, tumour, ulcer). (various references) | |
Japanese Katakana | のうよう (boil), できもの (boil, growth, pimple, rash, tumour, ulcer), でけもの (boil, growth, pimple, rash, tumour, ulcer). (various references) | |
Korean | 농양 (Abscesses). (various references) | |
Manx | lhieeney ingyragh, bolgan ingyragh, askaid vooar. (various references) | |
Norwegian | svulst (growth, tumor, tumour), byll. (various references) | |
Pig Latin | abscessay.(various references) | |
Portuguese | abcesso (tumor, tumour), apostema. (various references) | |
Romanian | abces (boil, gathering), bubã (boil, bruise, drawback, hindrance, puff, sorrow, swelling, trouble, ulcer). (various references) | |
Russian | абсцесс. (various references) | |
Scottish | othar (ulcer). (various references) | |
Serbo-Croatian | apsces, gnojni čir (blain). (various references) | |
Spanish | absceso (fester, gathering). (various references) | |
Sranan | posten. (various references) | |
Swedish | böld (boil, carbuncle, furuncle, ulcer), abscess. (various references) | |
Turkish | apse (gathering). (various references) | |
Ukranian | гнійник (aposteme), нарив (blain). (various references) | |
Welsh | crynhofa, crug (barrow, blister, heap, hillock, multitude, tumulus), cornwyd (boil, sore), casgliad (boil, collection, conclusion, gathering). (various references) | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various translation references. | ||
| Language | Period | Translations |
| Latin | 500 BCE-Modern | abscessus. (various references) |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references. | ||
Derivations | |
Words beginning with "abscess": abscessed, abscesses, abscessing. (additional references) | |
| |
"Abscess" is suggested in spellcheckers for the following: abbcess, abccess, abces, abcess, abcsess, abecess, abscuss, absess, abycess. (additional references) | |
| Source: compiled by the editor, based on several corpora (additional references). | |
| # of Phoneme Matches | Pronunciation | Word(s) rhyming with "abscess" (pronounced a"bse's) |
| 3 | -s e' s | access, excess, process. |
Source: compiled by the editor (additional references); see credits. | ||
Scrabble® Enable2K-Verified Anagrams | |
| Words within the letters "a-b-c-e-s-s-s" | |
-1 letter: basses. | |
-2 letters: asses, bases, cases, sabes, scabs. | |
-3 letters: aces, base, bass, cabs, case, cess, sabe, sabs, sacs, sass, scab, seas, secs. | |
-4 letters: abs, ace, ass, bas, cab, ess, sab, sac, sae, sea, sec. | |
-5 letters: ab, ae, as, ba, be, es. | |
| Words containing the letters "a-b-c-e-s-s-s" | |
+1 letter: abscises. | |
+2 letters: abscessed, abscesses, abscissae, subcastes, subcauses, subscales, subspaces. | |
+3 letters: abscessing, crossbeams, scabiouses, subchasers, subclassed, subclasses, substances. | |
+4 letters: backcrosses, backslashes, blacknesses, chessboards, crabgrasses, discussable, subacidness, subsurfaces. | |
+5 letters: abjectnesses, abstractness, backsplashes, brackishness, bunchgrasses, contrabasses, crossbearers, scabrousness, scarabaeuses, sociableness, swashbuckles. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. SCRABBLE® is a registered trademark. All intellectual property rights in and to the game are owned in the U.S.A and Canada by Hasbro Inc., and throughout the rest of the world by J.W. Spear & Sons Limited of Maidenhead, Berkshire, England, a subsidiary of Mattel Inc. Mattel and Spear are not affiliated with Hasbro. | |
Hexadecimal (or equivalents, 770AD-1900s) (references)41 62 73 63 65 73 73 |
| Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519; backwards) (references)
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| American Sign Language (origins from 1620-1817 in Italy and, especially, France) (references)
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| Semaphore (1791, in France) (references)
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| Braille (1829, in France) (references)
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Morse Code (1836) (references).- -... ... -.-. . ... ... |
| Dancing Men (Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, 1903) (references)
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Binary Code (1918-1938, probably earlier) (references)01000001 01100010 01110011 01100011 01100101 01110011 01110011 |
HTML Code (1990) (references)A b s c e s s |
ISO 10646 (1991-1993) (references)0041 0062 0073 0063 0065 0073 0073 |
| British Sign Language (Fingerspelling, BSL; 1992, British Deaf Association Dictionary of British Sign Language) (references)
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Encryption (beginner's substitution cypher): (references)35688569718585 |
| 1. Definition 2. Crosswords 3. Usage: Modern 4. Usage: Commercial | 5. Quotations: Non-fiction 6. Usage Frequency 7. Expressions 8. Expressions: Internet | 9. Translations: Modern 10. Translations: Ancient 11. Derivations 12. Rhymes | 13. Anagrams 14. Orthography 15. Bibliography |
Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
