relapse
Americanverb (used without object)
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relapses,
present (3rd person singular)
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relapsed,
past participle, past
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relapsing
present participle
noun
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relapses
plural
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an act or instance of relapsing.
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a return of a disease or illness after partial recovery from it.
verb
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to lapse back into a former state or condition, esp one involving bad habits
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to become ill again after apparent recovery
noun
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the act or an instance of relapsing
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the return of ill health after an apparent or partial recovery
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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relapsesimple
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relapsessimple
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have relapsedperfect
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has relapsedperfect
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am relapsingprogressive
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are relapsingprogressive
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is relapsingprogressive
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have been relapsingperfect progressive
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has been relapsingperfect progressive
Past
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relapsedsimple
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had relapsedperfect
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was relapsingprogressive
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were relapsingprogressive
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had been relapsingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of relapse
First recorded in 1400–50; (for the verb) late Middle English, from Latin relāpsus “slid back,” past participle of relābī “to slide back, revert,” from re- re- + lābī “to fall, slide, make a mistake”; noun derivative of the verb
Explanation
A relapse is a decline, especially of someone's health. If your grandmother survived cancer only to have it return two years later, you could say she suffered a relapse. Relapse implies that someone has recovered from an illness and slid back into a worse state, like when you are getting over a cold but then you suddenly feel bad all over again. Unwanted behavior can also be described this way; if you find yourself biting your nails again, it's a nail-biting relapse. The Latin word relabi is the root of relapse, slip back.
Vocabulary lists containing relapse
Spinnin' Around
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Esperanza Rising
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100 SAT words Beginning with "R"
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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.
See Examples For:
Novartis said its drug reduced the annualized relapse rate and inflammatory brain lesions relative to the rival medicine.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 1, 2026
“What this vaccine does is reduce that risk of relapse significantly.”
From MarketWatch ● Aug. 20, 2026
It is often given to patients to prevent a relapse.
From BBC ● Aug. 19, 2026
Now, after 33 months of follow-up, none of the patients have experienced a relapse.
From Science Daily ● May 6, 2026
The news of the president's late-July relapse shocked and disappointed everyone, including his doctors.
From "Ambushed!" by Gail Jarrow
The European Commission approved Cenrifki for secondary progressive multiple sclerosis without relapses.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 23, 2026
Although antibiotics are commonly used to treat the infection, many patients experience relapses after treatment.
From Science Daily ● Mar. 11, 2026
If a patient relapses or breaks a rule in a rehab facility, the knee-jerk impulse should not be to discharge them from the program.
From Slate ● Dec. 19, 2025
Borg admits to several relapses during the 1990s when he also made an abbreviated tennis comeback.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 18, 2025
It’s best to get an experienced one, for he relapses into silence.
From "Cannery Row" by John Steinbeck
Yemen relapsed into war in July after years of relative calm punctured by sporadic violence and deepening poverty.
From Barron's ● Sep. 10, 2026
But all patients had previously relapsed or failed to respond to other immunotherapies.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 14, 2026
Her MS hasn’t relapsed in a while, but she has limited sensation in her hands, feet and ankles, and says she sometimes has trouble with her short-term memory.
From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 9, 2025
While the treatment was initially successful for two years, Isobel unfortunately relapsed in October 2022 with several tumours found across her body.
From BBC ● Jul. 14, 2024
Showed improvement as a result of medication, relapsed after second miscarriage.
From "We Were Here" by Matt De La Peña
The studies enrolled around 2,000 patients with relapsing multiple sclerosis—the most common form of the disease, in which patients experience new or worsening neurological symptoms—and evaluated Novartis’s drug against Sanofi’s Aubagio.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 1, 2026
This allowed them to identify traces of several pathogens, including Yersinia pestis, the bacterium responsible for plague, and Borrelia recurrentis, which causes louse borne relapsing fever.
From Science Daily ● Jul. 8, 2026
Almost a decade later, the Times looks to be relapsing into bad form.
From Salon ● Apr. 6, 2026
The New South Wales coroner said Dr Andrea Boros-Lavack had provided 40-year-old Cauchi "exemplary" care over a long period, but failed to heed warnings from family that he may be relapsing, years before the attack.
From BBC ● Feb. 4, 2026
"Alive," she echoes, as if she were relapsing to her old quoting days.
From "How the García Girls Lost Their Accents" by Julia Alvarez
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.
