therapeutic
Americanadjective
noun
adjective
-
of or relating to the treatment of disease; curative
-
serving or performed to maintain health
therapeutic abortion
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of therapeutic
1535–45; < New Latin therapeuticus < Greek therapeutikós, equivalent to therapeú ( ein ) to attend, treat medically (akin to therápōn attendant) + -tikos -tic
Explanation
Whether you’re talking about a therapeutic drug or a therapeutic exercise plan, something that is therapeutic helps to heal or to restore health. The adjective therapeutic can be traced all the way back to the Greek word therapeutikos (from therapeuein, meaning “to attend” or “to treat”). Although the word relates to healing or soothing, therapeutic isn’t reserved only for drugs or medical treatments. You’ve probably heard particular activities referred to as therapeutic, which just means that doing that activity makes you feel rejuvenated. You might consider shopping for shoes, for example, to be a therapeutic activity — at least until the credit card bill arrives.
Vocabulary lists containing therapeutic
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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.
Rancho San Antonio is a “multi-service non-profit organization that provides both traditional and non-traditional trauma-informed therapeutic services to youth and families,” according to its website.
From Los Angeles Times • May 28, 2026
No vaccine or therapeutic treatment exists for the Bundibugyo strain of Ebola responsible for the latest outbreak of the disease, which has killed more than 15,000 people in Africa in the past half century.
From Barron's • May 19, 2026
Ruud Dobber, executive vice president of AstraZeneca’s biopharmaceuticals business, said the approval brings a new treatment to a disease that has had little therapeutic progress for the past two decades.
From The Wall Street Journal • May 18, 2026
She believes memory activities or writing letters to loved-ones helps, adding: "They'll never see it but it's therapeutic."
From BBC • May 16, 2026
The counselor encouraged Shin to turn his therapeutic diary into the memoir that the Database Center published in Korean in 2007.
From "Escape from Camp 14: One Man's Remarkable Odyssey from North Korea to Freedom in the West" by Blaine Harden
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.
