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症

zhèng / zhēng
noun #1,936

Meanings

  1. 1 disease; illness; condition
  2. 2 symptom; syndrome

Examples

Tā 有 抑郁症。
Tā yǒu yìyùzhèng.
He has depression.
Nǐ 有 什么 症状？
Nǐ yǒu shénme zhèngzhuàng?
What symptoms do you have?
癌症 是 一种 严重 的 疾病。
Áizhèng shì yī zhǒng yánzhòng de jíbìng.
Cancer is a serious disease.

Tips

usage
症 is the standard suffix turning a noun into a medical condition: 癌 (cancer) + 症 → 癌症 (cancer as a disease), 炎 (inflammation) → 炎症, 抑郁 (depressed) → 抑郁症. The compound 症状 means 'symptoms' — what a doctor asks about.
mistakes
症 is polyphone: read zhèng for everything medical, but zhēng in the single compound 症结 (sticking point / abdominal lump in TCM). The traditional form for the zhēng reading was originally 癥; modern simplified merges both glyphs into 症, so the tone is the only cue.

Components

radical
疒 nè
sickness (radical form)
Outer sickness-radical 疒 — the indexing radical, picturing a person reclining on a bed. Standard wrapper for illness vocabulary: 病 (ill), 疼 (ache), 疲 (weary), 疫 (epidemic). Sets the semantic stage: a body laid out under a roof, suffering.
phonetic
正 zhèng
upright; correct
Inner 正 supplies the sound zhèng exactly. Phonetic family: 政 (politics), 整 (whole), 征 (campaign) — all on 正. Semantically silent here, but a happy mnemonic accident: 正 means 'correct,' so 症 reads as 'pinning down the correct (diagnosis) for the illness.'

Stroke Order

症 zhèng