Vocabulary: Medical Words

catatonic

Alice's parents are killed in a fire. Driven catatonic and having attempted suicide (note her bandaged wrists), she is institutionalised in Rutledge Asylum. Years later Alice is called by the White Rabbit to the aid of a radically altered Wonderland, under threat from the Red Queen, the evil despot who has enslaved its people. The Cheshire Cat is a frightening incarnation, and is her constant companion throughout the game, popping up now and again to guide the player or offer advice.

medical oddities

medical quacks


Pschological Oddities

neurasthenic

… In imagining what might have happened, one of America's most provocative young writers, Katie Roiphe, has created a deep, richly textured fictional portrait of Alice and Dodgson: she changing from an unruly child to a bewitching adolescent, and he, a diffident, neurasthenic adult whose increasing obsession with her almost destroys him.
2004. Publisher's description of fiction Still She Haunts Me by Katie Roiphe.
neurasthenic royal is accused of making more crank calls.
Time mag's Winners and Losers Page 1. On Diana, Princess of Wales.
neurasthenic = of or relating to or suffering from neurasthenia; nervous breakdown.

science/medical related

etiology

SARS [Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome], an atypical pneumonia of unknown etiology, was recognized at the end of February 2003.
The World Health Organization, 2003-03