Paediatry

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. The branch of medicine concerned with the health, development and treatment of infants, children and adolescents
2. A medical specialty devoted to caring for young patients and the diseases that affect growing bodies from birth onward
3. Medical practice focused on the care of children, covering their illnesses, growth and wellbeing through youth

Etymology: "Paediatry" is a variant spelling of "paediatrics" in the sense of the medical field of treating children, and it is built from two Greek elements: "paed-", meaning "child," and "-iatry," a suffix drawn from the Greek "iatreia," meaning "medical treatment" or "healing." The suffix appears in a family of English medical terms such as "psychiatry" and "geriatry," so "paediatry" follows the same pattern, pairing a classical root for a group of patients with the familiar ending for a branch of medicine. The spelling "paed-" reflects the British and older style of writing Greek-derived words with the diphthong "ae." American usage typically writes "pediatry" instead. Both forms describe the same specialty, and the word is most often encountered in its longer adjectival or noun-derived forms, but the core idea stays simple: a healer devoted to children.