pathologist

American  

[puh-thah-luh-jist] / pəˈθɑ lə dʒɪst /

noun

1. a person who studies or works in pathology.

2. a medical doctor who specializes in diagnosing diseases.

3. Also called forensic pathologist. a medical doctor whose specialty is determining why someone died by examining their body.

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Explanation

A student who is fascinated with the causes of disease and death might decide to go to medical school and become a pathologist. A medical doctor who performs autopsies to learn how patients died is a pathologist. Other pathologists trace illness back to their root causes, or diagnose diseases such as cancer. When a doctor decides to to become a pathologist, her field is called "pathology." The Greek root of both words is pathologikos, "treating of disease," which combines pathos, "suffering," with logia, "study, or the study of."

Example Sentences

Scolyer is survived by his wife, fellow pathologist Katie Nicholl, and his three children.

From BBC • Jun. 7, 2026

“It’s probably the perfect storm of a contagion coming into the right contact for a confined group,” said Jeffrey SoRelle, a pathologist at the University of Texas Southwestern whose lab researches viral genomics.

From The Wall Street Journal • May 6, 2026

It's precisely the complexity of Muirhead's personality that makes her such a compelling figure as, according to Allott, she "was articulate and intelligent, a promising young pathologist with eight years of medical training".

From BBC • Apr. 28, 2026

A forensic pathologist conducted a postmortem examination as part of the sheriff’s investigation into the woman’s death.

From Los Angeles Times • Apr. 21, 2026

In 1986, Gene Johnson had infected monkeys with Ebola and Marburg by letting them breathe it into their lungs, and she had been the pathologist for that experiment.

From "The Hot Zone" by Richard Preston