hospitalize

American  

[hos-pi-tl-ahyz] / ˈhɒs pɪ tlˌaɪz /

especially British, hospitalise

verb (used with object)

hospitalized, hospitalizing

1. to place in a hospital for medical care or observation.

   The doctor hospitalized grandfather as soon as she checked his heart.

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hospitalize British  

/ ˈhɒspɪtəˌlaɪz /

verb

1. (tr) to admit or send (a person) into a hospital

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Other Word Forms

• rehospitalize
  verb (used with object)
• unhospitalized
  adjective

Etymology

Origin of hospitalize

First recorded in 1900–05; hospital + -ize

Explanation

To hospitalize is either to check a patient into a hospital, or to injure someone seriously enough that they need to be treated in a hospital. If you get a bad infection, your doctor may decide to hospitalize you. Any time doctors decide that a patient ought to be treated intensively or needs a serious kind of surgery, they hospitalize their patient. It's more common to find this verb in the phrase "was hospitalized," as in "My favorite basketball player was hospitalized after collapsing on the court." Grammar snobs have long disapproved of verbs formed with the -ize suffix, and hospitalize was controversial when it was coined around 1870.

Example Sentences

When he gets unruly, they discharge or hospitalize him.

From Los Angeles Times • Feb. 10, 2024

The country has new vaccines for COVID, influenza and RSV, the three fall respiratory viruses that hospitalize and kill hundreds of thousands annually.

From Seattle Times • Sep. 6, 2023

The girl’s mother had previously told The Associated Press that agents had repeatedly ignored her pleas to hospitalize her medically fragile daughter, who had a history of heart problems and sick cell anemia.

From Washington Times • May 21, 2023

“The police are not looking to involuntarily hospitalize people who are not a danger to others,” said Debbie Pavick, chief clinical officer for Thresholds, a nonprofit behavioral health organization that works with homeless people.

From New York Times • Nov. 30, 2022

I cannot get her out of this steel block unless I hospitalize her, perhaps operate.

From Sinister Paradise by Williams, Robert Moore