Meanings
- uncountablemedicineThe use of multiple drugs to treat multiple concurrent disorders in the same (now especially elderly) patient, chiefly with connotations of indiscriminate or excessive prescription (involving overmedication and overprescription).First known use 18th c.
Critics denounced physicians as meddlesome, capriciously practising an often dangerous polypharmacy – a blunderbuss approach.
1997, Roy Porter, The Greatest Benefit to Mankind, Folio Society, published 2016, page 2261 more example
Faced with wheezing, blue-faced patients, they felt they had to do something, and the approach they adopted was polypragmatism, or polypharmacy: they threw the medicine cabinet at the problem.
2017, Laura Spinney, Pale Rider: The Spanish Flu of 1918 and How it Changed the World, →ISBN
Synonyms & antonyms
Origin
- Ancient Greekπολυφάρμακος
- Englishpolypharmacy
From poly- + pharmacy, after Ancient Greek πολυφάρμακος (poluphármakos).
More words from Ancient Greek
Full word history & related roots →Translations
Chinese Mandarin 多重用藥 /多重用药
- 多重用藥 /多重用药 (duōchóng yòngyào)Translations
Finnish monilääkitys
- monilääkitysTranslations
German Multimedikation, Polypharmazie
- MultimedikationTranslations
- PolypharmazieTranslations
- PolypharmakotherapieTranslations
Icelandic lyfjaofgjöf
- lyfjaofgjöfTranslations
Japanese 多剤併用
- 多剤併用 (tazaiheiyō)Translations
Latin polypharmacia
- polypharmaciaTranslations
Polish polipragmazja
- polipragmazjaTranslations
Spanish polimedicación
- polimedicaciónTranslations
Cite this entry
polypharmacy. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 2, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/polypharmacy
“polypharmacy.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/polypharmacy. Accessed November 2, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “polypharmacy,” accessed November 2, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/polypharmacy.
Source: polypharmacy on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.