Nilutamide

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A nonsteroidal antiandrogen medication that blocks the effects of androgens in the body, used primarily in the treatment of metastatic prostate cancer
2. An antiandrogen compound that inhibits the action of male hormones on cancer cells, employed therapeutically to manage advanced prostate malignancy
3. A drug that antagonizes androgen receptors in prostate tissue, administered to patients with metastatic prostate cancer to slow tumor progression

Etymology: Nilutamide is a pharmaceutical name, and its history is a matter of drug-naming convention rather than an old word with a long road behind it. The name is built from two parts: a prefix and a suffix. The "-lutamide" ending marks the drug as a nonsteroidal antiandrogen, a class of compounds that blocks the effects of male sex hormones. Pharmaceutical nomenclature uses shared endings like this so that chemically related drugs can be recognised by name alone. The first part of the name, "nil-", is a fragment chosen as a distinguishing element within that naming scheme rather than a dictionary word with its own meaning. Because the name is a coinage made for a specific compound, there is no older everyday sense to trace, and the earlier history of the word is essentially the history of the drug itself.