Medical Words Your Doctor Uses, Explained

Doctors have a habit of writing in a kind of shorthand. You hear a word across the desk, nod politely, and then find the same word waiting for you in your report that evening. Three of the most common are erythematous, induration and sternal notch. They sound heavy. Their meanings are not.

Here is the plain version of each one: what it means, where you are likely to meet it, and what it cannot tell you on its own. This guide explains words only. It does not read your results, and it is not medical advice. If a word in your own report worries you, talk to your clinician — they can explain it against the full picture of your health, which a single word never shows.

The Three Words at a Glance

Word	Plain meaning	How it is judged
Erythematous	Red-looking skin or tissue	By sight
Induration	An area that has become firm or hard	By touch
Sternal notch	The dip at the top of the breastbone	A place, not a finding

Notice the pattern. Two of the words describe what a clinician sees or feels during an examination. The third simply names a spot on the body. None of them is a diagnosis.

Erythematous: The Word for Red

What erythematous means

Erythematous means that skin or tissue looks red. The redness comes from tiny blood vessels near the surface — the capillaries — widening and carrying more blood than usual. The National Library of Medicine’s MeSH vocabulary defines the related noun, erythema, as redness of the skin produced by congestion of the capillaries. Erythematous is simply the describing form: an erythematous rash is a red rash.

The word comes from the Greek erythros, meaning red. Once you know that, the word stops looking like a warning and starts looking like what it is — a colour note.

Where you will meet this word

You will most often find it in skin descriptions: “erythematous patches on both shins”, for example. It also appears in examination notes for the throat (“erythematous tonsils”), in dentistry for red gums, and in endoscopy reports, where the lining of the stomach or bowel may be described as erythematous mucosa. Wherever a clinician can see a surface, this word can turn up.

What erythematous does not tell you

Redness has many everyday causes — sunburn, heat, a scratch, an allergy, irritation from a new soap — and it can also show up with infection or inflammation. The word itself does not say which. It records an appearance, not a reason. That is why the same word can sit in a completely routine report and in a report that needs follow-up. The words around it, and the clinician who examined you, carry the meaning.

Induration: The Word for Firm

What induration means

Induration means an area of tissue has become firm or hard. The U.S. National Cancer Institute’s dictionary defines it as an abnormally hard spot or area on the skin, and the process behind it is usually a deep thickening of the skin. Verywell Health, in a medically reviewed explainer, describes indurated skin as tissue that feels firmer to the touch than the skin around it, often looks thick, and can result from inflammation or from cells moving into the area.

Unlike redness, induration cannot be seen properly. It is found by pressing gently with the fingers. Clinicians call that palpation, and it is why a doctor may press on a spot that looks unremarkable — they are feeling for firmness your eyes would miss.

Where you will meet this word

The most famous example is the tuberculin (TB) skin test. After the test injection, a clinician measures the raised, firm area at the site — the induration — in millimetres. The redness around it is not measured. Only the firm part counts. You may also meet the word in wound notes (“induration around the wound edge”), in descriptions of skin infections or abscesses, after vaccinations, and in pathology reports.

What induration does not tell you

Firmness is a sign, not a verdict. Skin infections, inflamed cysts, insect bites, scarring and several long-term skin conditions can all produce it. Verywell Health lists causes as varied as infection, hives and panniculitis (inflammation of the fat layer under the skin). So a note of induration tells you what the clinician felt — harder tissue than expected — and the cause has to come from everything else: where it is, how long it has been there, and what other signs sit next to it.

Sternal Notch: The Dip at the Top of Your Breastbone

Where the sternal notch is

Run a finger down to the soft dip at the very base of your throat, between the inner ends of your two collarbones. That dip is the sternal notch. It is a shallow, U-shaped hollow in the top edge of the manubrium, the broad upper section of the sternum (breastbone). TeachMeAnatomy describes how the upper surface of the manubrium is concave, forming this depression, which is visible under the skin. It has two other names you may see in reports: the jugular notch and the suprasternal notch. All three names mean the same dip.

Why clinicians use it as a landmark

Because everyone has one and it is easy to find, the notch works as a starting point. A clinician palpates the windpipe (trachea) in the notch to check it sits in the middle. Counting ribs starts just below it, at the sternal angle — the ridge where the manubrium meets the body of the sternum, roughly 5 cm further down. The notch also sits at about the level of the second and third thoracic vertebrae (T2/T3), which makes it a useful reference on scans and X-rays.

What sternal notch does not mean

This word is different from the other two. Erythematous and induration describe findings — things a clinician observed. Sternal notch describes anatomy — a normal part of every skeleton. Seeing it in a report usually means a measurement or examination was anchored there, the way a letter might say “opposite the station”. It says where, not what is wrong.

How the Three Words Can Appear Together

Here is a short, made-up example — invented for this guide, not taken from any real report:

“Skin: an erythematous patch over the left shin with 2 cm of induration at its centre. Trachea central, palpated at the sternal notch.”

Read it again with your new vocabulary. The patch looks red. Its centre feels firm, across about 2 cm. The windpipe was checked in the dip at the base of the throat and sits in the middle, as it should. Three long words, one short and ordinary set of observations.

If other words on your report are still a puzzle, our guide to medical words on your test results explains report terms such as “unremarkable” in the same plain style. And if you have ever puzzled over shorthand instead — a prescription marked three times a day, say — our explainer on the TID medical abbreviation covers that too. One more from the same series: our guide to the prediabetes ICD-10 code shows how a code on your record works — and what it cannot tell you alone.

Questions Worth Asking Your Clinician

A glossary can translate a word. It cannot translate your situation. These questions are safe to ask about any report wording, and a good clinician will expect them:

• “Is this word describing how something looks, how it feels, or just where it is?”
• “Is this finding normal for someone in my situation?”
• “Does this word, on its own, need any follow-up — or only with the rest of the report?”
• “If I should watch this, what change should make me call you?”

Sources: National Library of Medicine MeSH definition of erythema (ncbi.nlm.nih.gov); National Cancer Institute dictionary definition of induration (via TheFreeDictionary); Verywell Health, “6 Causes of Indurated Skin” (medically reviewed); TeachMeAnatomy, “The Sternum”; Earth’s Lab, surface landmarks of the thoracic wall. This article is a plain-language explainer only. It is general information, not medical advice, and it cannot interpret your own results — talk to your clinician about anything in your report that concerns you.