Medical Dictionary Definitions A-Z List
Medical Dictionary Definitions A - Z - «L»:
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LaMontagne
LaMontagne: See: La Montagne, John....
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Lancet
Lancet: A small pointed knife; a surgical instrument with a short, wide, sharp-pointed, two-edged blade; a little knife with a small point. Lancets are used today to prick the skin (a finger, foot, ear lobe, etc.) to obtain a small quantity of capillary blood for testing.
A venerable medical journa...
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Lancet device
Lancet device: See: Lancing device....
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Lancet, The
Lancet, The: A weekly medical journal headquartered in London. Published uninterruptedly and with the same title since 1823, The Lancet is "the longest running medical journal in the world."
Thomas Wakley founded The Lancet and served as its first editor. He originally intended it to serve as a for...
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Lancing device
Lancing device: A device that holds a lancet firmly, and when triggered, moves the lancet linearly ahead to prick the skin in a controlled manner. Lancing devices usually can be adjusted to alter the depth that the lancet goes into the skin. The purpose is to obtain a small amount of capillary bloo...
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Landau-Kleffner syndrome
Landau-Kleffner syndrome: A disorder with seizures starting in childhood in which the patient loses skills, such as speech, and develops behavior characteristic of autism.
A major feature of the Landau-Kleffner syndrome (LKS) is the gradual or sudden loss of the ability to understand and use spoke...
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Landry ascending paralysis
Landry ascending paralysis: A particularly
virulent form of Guillain-Barre syndrome. The disorder often begins with a flu-like illness that brings on general physical weakness, but is then characterized by rapidly
progressing paralysis that starts in the legs and arms, and
may move on (ascend) t...
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Landry's ascending paralysis
Landry's ascending paralysis: A particularly
virulent form of Guillain-Barre syndrome. The disorder often begins with a flu-like illness that brings on general physical weakness, but is then characterized by rapidly
progressing paralysis that starts in the legs and arms, and
may move on (ascend) ...
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Landslide injury
Landslide injury: Injury from a landslide or mudslide. A landslide is when masses of rock, earth, or debris move down a slope. Debris flows, also known as mudslides, are a common type of fast-moving landslide that tends to flow in channels.
The health hazards associated with landslides and mudflows ...
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Langer-Saldino type achondrogenesis
Langer-Saldino type achondrogenesis: See: Achondrogenesis type II....
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Langerhans, islets of
Langerhans, islets of: Best known as the insulin-producing
tissue, the
islets
of Langerhans do more than that. They are groups of
specialized cells in
the
pancreas that make and secrete hormones. Named after the
German
pathologist
Paul Langerhans (1847-1888), who discovered them in 1869,
these c...
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Lansing virus
Lansing virus: Type 2 poliovirus. Named after the city in Michigan where the first patient lived who was found to have this virus. There are two other strains of poliovirus: Type 1 (known as the Brunhilde virus) and Type 3 (known as the Leon virus). Immunity to one strain does not provide protection...
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Lanugo
Lanugo: Downy hair on the body of the fetus and newborn
baby. It is the first hair to be produced by the fetal hair
follicles, usually appearing on the fetus at about five months of
gestation. It is very fine, soft, and usually unpigmented. Although
lanugo is normally shed before birth around s...
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Laparoscope
Laparoscope: An instrument through which structures within the abdomen and pelvis can be seen. A small surgical incision (cut) is made in the abdominal wall to permit the laparoscope to enter the abdomen or pelvis. A diversity of tubes can be pushed through the same incision or other small incisions...
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Laparoscopic
Laparoscopic:
1. Pertaining to the procedure of laparoscopy.
2. Pertaining to a laparoscope, the instrument by which laparoscopy is done.
3. Performed by laparoscopy.
4. Performed with a laparoscope.
Laparoscopic comes from two Greek words. The first is lapara, which means "the soft parts of ...
