rale

plural rales · alternative râle

1. in pluralmedicineAn abnormal clicking, rattling or crackling sound, made by one or both lungs and heard with a stethoscope, caused by the popping open of airways collapsed by fluid or exudate, or sometimes by pulmonary edema.

   But after all the educated classes have a right to expect that their medical man will know the difference between a mitral murmur and a bronchitic rale.

   1894, Arthur Conan Doyle, Round Red Lamp

   2 more examples

   Michael Colot, aged fifteen days, of a strong constitution, not having been sick from the time of birth, was, on the 22nd of November, taken with a violent cough, accompanied with a rale which could be heard without recourse to auscultation.

   1840, CM Billard, A Treatise on the Diseases of Infants, page 416

   If you were to tell a patient that he had a ‘rhonchus’ in his chest, he would imagine that it was something formidable, while, if you said that he had a ‘râle’ he would not be alarmed.

   1861, Austin Flint, American Medical Times, 7 Dec 1961

   Synonyms: crackles