Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- noun Inflammation of the pleura, usually occurring as a complication of a disease such as pneumonia, accompanied by accumulation of fluid in the pleural cavity, chills, fever, and painful breathing and coughing.
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun Inflammation of the pleura.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun (Med.) An inflammation of the pleura, usually accompanied with fever, pain, difficult respiration, and cough, and with exudation into the pleural cavity.
- noun (Bot.) The plant itself, which has deep orange-colored flowers; -- called also
butterfly weed .
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun pathology
Inflammation oflung pleura .
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- noun inflammation of the pleura of the lungs (especially the parietal layer)
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
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Examples
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He sang about grannies in relation to public transport, enormous jobbies and wellington boots and managed to rhyme the word pleurisy with infirmary.
Telegraph.co.uk - Telegraph online, Daily Telegraph, Sunday Telegraph Hardeep Singh Kohli 2012
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If man does not shun and turn away from evils as sins, therefore, the external and at the same time the internal of his thought and will are infected and destroyed, comparatively as the pleura is by the disease in it called pleurisy, of which the body dies.
Angelic Wisdom about Divine Providence Emanuel Swedenborg 1730
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But theory cares nothing for this; it calls pleurisy a more serious mischief than a stumble; yet the latter may become incidentally the more serious, if the fall due to it leads to your being taken prisoner or put to death the enemy.)
The Nicomachean Ethics Aristotle 2002
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I apparently have something called pleurisy, which, although it sounds like something you'd catch from a frisky co-ed after an all-night kegger, is actually inflammation of the lining of your lungs.
Archive 2009-08-01 Kosmo 2009
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I apparently have something called pleurisy, which, although it sounds like something you'd catch from a frisky co-ed after an all-night kegger, is actually inflammation of the lining of your lungs.
Further proof that the universe tends equally toward irony as entropy: Kosmo 2009
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But theory cares nothing for this; it calls pleurisy a more serious mischief than a stumble; yet the latter may become incidentally the more serious, if the fall due to it leads to your being taken prisoner or put to death the enemy.)
The NICOMACHEAN ETHICS Aristotle 1865
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Besides the fever, he suffered from a pain in the side, which the Greeks call pleurisy; but he still persisted in fasting, and in keeping up his strength only by draughts taken at very long intervals.
The Early Middle Ages 500-1000 Robert Brentano 1964
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This flower has a variety of names: it is called pleurisy root, and wind root, and orange root.
The Library of Work and Play: Gardening and Farming. Ellen Eddy Shaw
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The uneasiness attending this hot paroxysm of fever, or fit of exertion, is very different from that, which attends the previous cold fit, or fit of quiescence, and is frequently the cause of inflammation, as in pleurisy, which is treated of in the next section.
Zoonomia, Vol. I Or, the Laws of Organic Life Erasmus Darwin 1766
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In assessing chest pain we also consider lung problems, including collapsed lung, infections and pleurisy, which is an inflammation around the lung.
chained_bear commented on the word pleurisy
Bear with me, it's a long text.
A Receipt for the PLEURISY.
When a Patient is first taken with a Pain in his Breast, or Side, with a smart Fever and Cough, I first give a Dose of Tartar Emetick, from one to six Grains, according to the Age of the Sick. Work it well off with warm Water. After it hath done working, let him sup Mutton or Chicken Broth. The next Day, if his Pulse continues quick and strong, I have him bled plentifully, and immediately after given him as much of the Pluerisy Root, pounded very fine, and then searched through a fine Search, as will lie upon a tolerable unreadable Case Knife, in a Cup of warm Water, and repeat the Dose every two Hours, until the Patient is perfectly recovered, which happens frequently after three Days, and never fails freeing him from Pain after six; but if he hath been ill some Days, and is very weak, it will be discreet to continue to give him one Dose every Night when he goes to Bed, until he regains his Strength, by the above Remedy. I have cured Hundreds, and never failed in a single Instance. In short, I am so well convinced of the Efficacy of this Method of treating a Pleursy that I would, for Half a per Cent. ensure the Life of any Person in that Disorder, to any Amount, if I could be sure of his beaing treated in that Manner any Time before he was actually speechless. If the Patient is very far gone, the Dose of Tartar Emetick must be increased; as too small a Dose, in such a State, will only disturb the Matter it cannot carry off. I have sometimes cured when the Patient has been so far gone that I have been obliged to have him carried upon a Bier by two Men, and a third to hold him whilst they were thus giving him Exercise to work his Vomit. In this Situation, the Case is so desperate that he must be bled as soon as his Vomit is done working, and then the Pleurisy Root given immediately, but it is always safest not to bleed until the Day after the Vomit, because if the Pulse is then strong you may be sure it is then a Pleurisy, and not a nervous Fever. There are three Sorts of the Pleurisy Root, commonly known by the Name of the Butterfly Weed; the one bears a white, the second an Orange coloured, and the third a dusky red coloured Blossom. The Orange Colour is what I have always used; it grows in almost every Enclosure, and is in full Bloom about Harvest, when it is to be got. It bears its Flowers in a large Bunch at Top, and may be easily known by the immense Numbers of Butterflies which are constantly on the Flowers.
THOMSON MASON.
—Virginia Gazette (Purdie & Dixon), Sept. 23, 1773
January 29, 2009