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acute disease

Cultural  

  1. A disease or disorder that lasts a short time, comes on rapidly, and is accompanied by distinct symptoms. (Compare chronic disease.)

Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

Some variants have caused longer or shorter acute disease periods.

From Slate • Jan. 19, 2024

In the mouse study, the acute disease was induced with an overdose of the drug acetaminophen, and the chronic disease was promoted with a diet.

From Science Daily • Dec. 7, 2023

“Many, many others with long covid had mild/non-hospitalized acute disease but went on to develop this debilitating, syndromic, ME/CFS-type long covid,” Putrino said, referring to chronic fatigue syndrome.

From Washington Post • Nov. 7, 2022

If millions of people end up developing persistent health issues after the acute disease stage, they will likely encounter a medical system unable to do much more than shrug.

From Scientific American • Feb. 15, 2022

What is proper in all instances of acute disease?

From A Treatise on Anatomy, Physiology, and Hygiene (Revised Edition) by Cutter, Calvin

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023

Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.