hospital
pronunciation
How to pronounce hospital in British English:
UK [ˈhɒspɪtl]
How to pronounce hospital in American English:
US [ˈhɑːspɪtl]
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- Noun:
- a health facility where patients receive treatment
- a medical institution where sick or injured people are given medical or surgical care
Word Origin
- hospital
- hospital: [13] Like hospices, hostels, and hotels, hospitals were originally simply places at which guests were received. The word comes via Old French hospital from medieval Latin hospitāle, a noun use of the adjective hospitālis ‘of a guest’. This in turn was derived from hospit-. the stem of Latin hospes ‘guest, host’.In English, hospital began its semantic shift in the 15th century, being used for a ‘home for the elderly or infirm, or for down-and-outs’; and the modern sense ‘place where the sick are treated’ first appeared in the 16th century. The original notion of ‘receiving guests’ survives, of course, in hospitality [14] and hospitable [16]. Hospice [19] comes via French from Latin hospitium ‘hospitality’, another derivative of hospes.=> hospice, hospitable, host, hostel, hotel
- hospital (n.)
- mid-13c., "shelter for the needy," from Old French hospital, ospital "hostel" (Modern French hôpital), from Late Latin hospitale "guest-house, inn," neuter of Latin adjective hospitalis "of a guest or host," from hospes (genitive hospitis); see host (n.1). Later "charitable institution to house and maintain the needy" (early 15c.); sense of "institution for sick people" is first recorded 1540s.
Synonym
Example
- 1. He died some days later in hospital .
- 2. He spent 44 days in the hospital before being discharged in july .
- 3. China added 50000 psychiatric hospital beds from 2003 to 2008 .
- 4. Eight people are still in hospital .
- 5. He died later in hospital .