Medicine & BodyGreek → English
Hematocrit
/hɪˈmætəkrɪt/noun
The proportion of blood volume made up of red cells, and the spun tube used to measure it.
The Greek roots
αἷμα
haîma
blood
κριτής
kritḗs
judge, separator
Literally: “blood judge”
The story of the word
The word named a machine before it named a number: Magnus Blix built a centrifuge in the 1890s that spun blood until the cells packed at the bottom and the plasma stood clear above, and the height of the column was read straight off the glass. κριτής comes from κρίνω, to separate then to judge, the same verb behind critic, crisis and criterion. Endurance athletes and the agencies that test them have been arguing about the number since the 1990s.
- How it travelled
- Ancient Greek → scientific coinage → English
- First recorded
- 19th century
Same family
hemoglobinanemiacrisiscriterion
In a sentence
A hematocrit of 30 explained why she was breathless climbing one flight of stairs.