Macrocephaly

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. An abnormal enlargement of the head that is disproportionate to body size, often caused by increased brain volume or accumulation of cerebrospinal fluid
2. A medical condition in which the head grows excessively large relative to the rest of the body, typically resulting from hydrocephalus or other neurological disorders
3. Excessive growth of the head beyond normal proportions, usually due to brain enlargement or fluid accumulation within the cranial cavity

Etymology: "Macrocephaly" is a plain technical compound, built from the Greek "makros," meaning "long" or "large," and "kephalē," meaning "head," with the suffix "-y" turning the head-word into a noun for a condition. Its parts are fully transparent: a macrocephalic person has an unusually large head. The word belongs to the same family of medical coinages as "microcephaly," its opposite, which uses the Greek "mikros," meaning "small." Both were assembled from classical building blocks in modern scientific language, so the ancient Greeks themselves had no such term, though they did have the raw materials.

Synonyms: megacephaly