Word of the Day

: February 11, 2007

stereotactic

adjective stair-ee-uh-TAK-tik

What It Means

: involving, being, utilizing, or used in a surgical technique for precisely directing the tip of a delicate instrument (as a needle) or beam of radiation in three planes using coordinates provided by medical imaging in order to reach a specific locus in the body

stereotactic in Context

"Brain surgery without the knife," declared an ad for stereotactic radiosurgery.

Did You Know?

At the beginning of the 20th century, neurosurgeons were experimenting with a technique used to direct the tip of a needle or an electrode in three spatial planes (length, width, and depth) to reach a particular place in the brain. At that time, the word for this technique was "stereotaxic," based on the prefix "stereo-" ("dealing with three dimensions of space") and "taxis" (referring to the manual restoration of a displaced body part). In 1950, "stereotactic" (based on "tactic," meaning "of or relating to touch") joined the medical vocabulary as a synonym of "stereotaxic." Around the same time, a noninvasive neurosurgery technique was developed using beams of radiation. It is this procedure that is now often referred to by "stereotactic" and (less frequently) "stereotaxic."