when is a combining vowel used in medical terminology
Medical terminology When more than one body part is used in the formation of a medical term, the individual word roots are joined together by using the combining form using the letter -o- to indicate the joining together of various body parts. For example if there is an inflammation of the stomach and intestines, this would be written as gastro- and enter- plus -itis, gastroenteritis. In this example, the -o- signifies the joining together of two body parts.
Phoneme A phoneme (/ˈfoʊniːm/) is one of the units of sound (or gesture in the case of sign languages, see chereme) that distinguish one word from another in a particular language. For example, in most dialects of English, the sound patterns /θɪn/ (thin) and /dɪn/ (din) are two separate words distinguished by the substitution of one phoneme, /θ/, for another phoneme, /d/. (Two words like this that differ in meaning through a contrast of a single phoneme form what is called a minimal pair). In many other languages these would be interpreted as exactly the same set of phonemes (i.e. /θ/ and /d/ would be considered the same).