formication

American  

[fawr-mi-key-shuhn] / ˌfɔr mɪˈkeɪ ʃən /

noun

1. a tactile hallucination involving the belief that something is crawling on the body or under the skin.

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formication British  

/ ˌfɔːmɪˈkeɪʃən /

noun

1. a sensation of insects crawling on the skin; symptom of a nerve disorder

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Etymology

Origin of formication

1700–10; < Latin (Pliny) formīcātiōn-, stem of formīcātiō a sensation that ants are crawling on one's skin, equivalent to formicā ( re ) to have such a sensation (verbal derivative of formīca ant) + -tiōn- -tion

Example Sentences

Even with oxygen, pilots may get the bends or the chokes.*Also: a man cannot whistle, and he is likely to suffer from formication �the feeling that ants are marching over his body. 43,000 Ft.

From Time Magazine Archive

A woman of fifty-two, married but having no children, and of negative family history, six years before the time of report showed the first symptoms of the affection, which began with formication in the finger-tips.

From Anomalies and Curiosities of Medicine by Pyle, Walter L. (Walter Lytle)

Sensation of formication in the calves of the legs.

From New, Old, and Forgotten Remedies: Papers by Many Writers by Anshutz, Edward Pollock

The thighs begin to struggle, as if formication was going on in the muscles.

From The Delight Makers by Bandelier, Adolph Francis Alphonse

But sooner or later peripheral neuritis develops, usually beginning with sensory disturbances, tingling, numbness, formication and occasionally cutaneous anaesthesia.

From Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 2, Slice 6 "Armour Plates" to "Arundel, Earls of" by Various