French health and emergency vocabulary: 341 words
Doctor, pharmacy, the body and emergency phrases for when it matters (English, Spanish, French, German, Italian, Portuguese). This page lists 40 of them with their French translations, then lets you practise the full set in either direction with spaced repetition.
English to French: the first 40 words
| English | French | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| help | aide | Assistance given to someone who needs it. |
| emergency | urgence | A sudden dangerous situation demanding immediate action. |
| doctor | médecin | A person trained to treat the ill and injured. |
| nurse | infirmier | A trained person who cares for patients, assisting the one who prescribes treatment. |
| hospital | hôpital | A building where the ill and injured are treated and stay overnight. |
| pharmacy | pharmacie | A shop where medicines are prepared and sold. |
| ambulance | ambulance | A vehicle that rushes the ill or injured for urgent care. |
| medicine | médicament | A medicinal drug or treatment, not the field of study. |
| pain | douleur | The unpleasant physical feeling caused by hurt or illness. Not bread. |
| fever | fièvre | An abnormally high body temperature during illness. |
| headache | mal de tête | An aching sensation inside the skull. |
| stomachache | mal de ventre | An aching feeling in the belly. |
| cough | toux | A sudden noisy expulsion of air from the throat and lungs. |
| cold | rhume | The illness, not the temperature. |
| flu | grippe | A contagious viral illness with aching, chills and high temperature. |
| allergy | allergie | A harmful bodily reaction to pollen, food or other normally harmless things. |
| injury | blessure | Physical harm or damage done to the body. |
| blood | sang | The red liquid pumped by the heart through veins. |
| broken bone | os cassé | A crack or snap in part of the skeleton. |
| burn | brûlure | A skin injury from heat, not a fire or verb. |
| prescription | ordonnance | A doctor's written order for medicine, not a recipe or general instruction. |
| pill | comprimé | A small solid disc of medicine that is swallowed. |
| bandage | bandage | A strip of cloth wound around a wound to protect it. |
| vaccine | vaccin | A preparation injected to make the body immune to a disease. |
| health | santé | The general condition of one's body and mind. |
| sick | malade | Suffering from an illness. Not the past form of seeking something. |
| healthy | en bonne santé | In good physical condition, free of illness. |
| tired | fatigué | Needing rest or sleep after effort. |
| dizzy | étourdi | Sensation of spinning or disorientation, not foolish. |
| body | corps | The whole physical structure of a person or animal. |
| head | tête | The topmost part of the body, containing the brain and the face. |
| face | visage | The front part of a person's skull, where the eyes and mouth are. |
| eye | œil | The round organ of sight, one on each side of the nose. |
| ear | oreille | The organ of hearing, one on each side of the skull. |
| nose | nez | The part in the middle of the face used for breathing and smelling. |
| mouth | bouche | The opening in the face used for eating and speaking. |
| tooth | dent | One of the hard white parts in the jaw used to bite and chew. |
| throat | gorge | The passage inside the front of the neck that food and air pass through. |
| neck | cou | The narrow part of the body joining the skull to the shoulders. |
| shoulder | épaule | The joint where the upper limb meets the trunk of the body. |
301 more words in the full “Health & Emergencies” library, each aligned across seven languages and scheduled for you by spaced repetition. Add it to your account and start drilling English to French in one click.
What to watch out for in French
- 174 of these 341 words are near-identical in English and French (51%) —
ambulance,bandage,muscle. Those are free; the value of drilling is in the rest. - Accents count. Answers are graded accent-sensitively, so you need
àâçéèêîïô— LinguaSwap shows a one-tap keypad for them while you type. - 341 words carry a usage note in the full library, for the cases where a direct translation would mislead you.
Practise French health and emergency vocabulary
Words come back just before you would forget them, and every language direction is tracked separately.