prophylactic
noun · adjective
Simple meaning
A medicine which preserves or defends against disease.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
prahfihlaktikSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
pɹɑfɪˈlæktɪk
This word is pronounced essentially the same in American and British English, so one transcription covers both.
IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) is a standard way of writing speech sounds.
Definition
Everyday modern meanings first, grouped by part of speech.
noun
A medicine which preserves or defends against disease; a preventive.
USspecifically
A prophylactic condom.
figuratively
Any device or mechanism intended to prevent harmful consequences.
adjective
Serving to prevent or protect against an undesired effect, especially disease or pregnancy
Word at a Glance
- Difficulty
- C2 · Proficient (estimated)
- Frequency
- Uncommon
- Formality
- Technical
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: A medicine which preserves or defends against disease; a preventive.
Used this way, prophylactic is a specialist word with a faintly unfavourable edge. This is a clinical use: it belongs to medical description, where it is factual rather than emotive.
- Emotional tone
- Slightly negative
- Formality
- Specialist/technical
- Intensity
- Moderate
- How common
- Specialized
- Connotation
- Critical or judgemental
- Usage feel
- Clinical and detached
Where it naturally appears
- Medicine/healthcare
- Science
- Technical/specialist writing
Usage note
In general conversation this sense usually needs explaining — outside its field, people reach for a plainer word.
Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.
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Common Patterns and Combinations
How this word naturally appears with others.
Other combinations
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Word Family
Related forms, grouped by how they connect.
Compound terms
Established multiword terms.
An agent or device intended to prevent conception.
Related Words
Connected to the same idea, not synonyms.
- preventativenoun
- radiotherapynoun
- preventivenoun
- anthraxnoun
- malarianoun
- therapeuticadjective
More about this wordSynonyms, forms, origin
Synonyms
Sense: serving to prevent or protect against an undesired effect
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Dictionary data from Wiktionary via the Free Dictionary API. Simple meanings, combinations and word intelligence are built from verified reference data, no AI is used to load this page.