Notes on usage: Disease

Illness  -  Disorder  -  Infection  -  Condition  -  Ailment  -  Bug

 

These are all words for a medical problem.

 

Disease a medical problem affecting humans, animals or plants, often caused by infection: He suffers from a rare blood disease.
Illness a medical problem, or a period of suffering from one: She died after a long illness.
Disorder (rather formal) an illness that causes a part of the body to stop functioning correctly: A rare disorder of the liver. Remember that disorder is generally not infectious. Disorder is used most frequently with words relating to mental problems, for example psychiatric, personality, mental and eating. When it is used to talk about physical problems, it is most often used with blood, bowel and kidney, and these are commonly serious, severe or rare.
Infection an illness that is caused by bacteria or a virus and that affects one part of the body: A throat infection.
Condition a medical problem that you have for a long time because it is not possible to cure it: A heart condition.
Ailment (rather formal) an illness that is not very serious: Childhood ailments.
Bug (informal) an infectious illness that is usually fairly mild: A nasty flu bug.

 

DISEASE OR ILLNESS?
Disease is used to talk about more severe physical medical problems, especially those that affect the organs. Illness is used to talk about both more severe and more minor medical problems, and those that affect mental health: heart/kidney/liver illness. | Mental disease. Disease is not used about a period of illness: She died after a-long disease.

 

PATTERNS
*to have/suffer from a(n) disease/illness/disorder/ infection/condition/ailment/bug
*to catch/contract/get/pick up a(n) disease/illness/ infection/bug

 

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Top Tips Abz Ingles - Notes on usage - Synonyms
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See also:

Common Phrasal Verbs	Irregular Verbs List
Common Sentences Errors	Frequently confused words
Common Clichés	Thematic list of Idioms
Common misspellings	Phrasal Verbs Particles list
Common Preposition	Lista de Términos Gramaticales

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