Welcome to the first unit of learning medical language. We begin with a study of how medical terms are structured… this will be the basis of how you will learn this language. The approach is not the traditional ‘vocabulary words’ you experienced in grade school… you will not be learning a word and memorizing its definition. The method presented is referred to “word building” … you will be learning parts of words or medical terms and using those words in healthcare settings. As we move through each medical specialty and body system you will be reusing word parts learned in previous units. So, that said, it is absolutely imperative that you no skip or fall behind in learning new word parts that will be introduced with each unit of study. Just as in math, if you skipped how to subtract or add you would not be successful in mastering division. One more thing before we get into this foundational unit … you will be learning beginning anatomy and physiology, not only because this study contains medical terminology, it is the ‘context’ for all the terms … if you learn a medical term related to a disease or procedure and don’t know the what and where of those terms you will not really know the language you speak. Now on to the structure of medical language … first our road map for this unit… the learning objectives, the walk away you should carry forward to subsequent units.