Human health and medicine

Speech Reception Threshold Test

Speech Reception Threshold Test (SRT, spondee threshold): audiology test finding the lowest hearing level at which a listener repeats 50% of two-syllable spondaic words, used to cross-check the pure-tone audiogram.

Speech Therapy

Speech therapy: assessment and treatment of speech, language, and swallowing disorders by speech-language pathologists (SLPs), credentialed via ASHA's CCC-SLP; covers pediatric speech sound disorders, post-stroke aphasia and dysphagia, and telepractice delivery.

Speedball (drug)

Speedball: simultaneous stimulant-opioid use, classically heroin plus cocaine injected together; variants include goofball (heroin-methamphetamine) and super speedball (cocaine with fentanyl); higher overdose risk than either drug alone.

Speleotherapy

Speleotherapy is the therapeutic use of the microclimate of caves and mines for chronic airway diseases such as asthma, widely practiced in Central and Eastern Europe.

Spencer Foreman

Spencer Foreman (1935–2013) was an American physician-executive who led Montefiore Medical Center in the Bronx from 1986 to 2007, building it into a thriving academic medical center.

Sperm banking

Sperm banking is a reproductive medicine service that collects, freezes, and stores sperm in liquid nitrogen, mainly to preserve fertility before cancer treatment and for donor conception.

Sperm Count

Sperm count, also called semen analysis, measures the number of sperm in an ejaculate; WHO 6th edition (2021) 5th centile is 16 million/ml concentration, 39 million total, not a fertile-infertile cutoff.

Sperm cryopreservation

Sperm cryopreservation is a reproductive medicine technique that freezes and stores sperm at −196 °C in liquid nitrogen for later insemination, IVF, or ICSI, preserving fertility before cancer treatment.

Sperm Motility

Sperm motility, the movement characteristics of spermatozoa in fresh semen, is graded by WHO as progressive, non-progressive, or immotile, with a 30% progressive reference limit, measured manually or by CASA.

Sperm retrieval

Sperm retrieval, also called testicular sperm retrieval, is a group of surgical procedures collecting sperm from the epididymis or testis for ICSI in azoospermia, used routinely since 1992.

Spermatocytic seminoma

Spermatocytic seminoma, now called spermatocytic tumour, is a rare testicular germ cell tumor of older men, unrelated to seminoma, lacking GCNIS, rarely metastasizing, cured by orchiectomy, with rare aggressive sarcomatous transformation.

Spermicide

Spermicide: chemical contraceptive, usually nonoxynol-9, in foams, gels, films, or suppositories; kills sperm, low effectiveness alone (18-28% annual failure), no STI protection, can irritate tissue.

Spesolimab

Spesolimab (brand name Spevigo, research code BI 655130) is a monoclonal antibody blocking the interleukin-36 receptor, approved in 2022 to treat generalized pustular psoriasis flares in adults.

SPH6162

SPH6162 (SPH-6162) is a preclinical WEE1-inhibitor small-molecule antitumor drug developed by Shanghai Pharmaceuticals' Central Research Institute; in October 2021 its ex-China rights were licensed to HUYABIO International for up to US$292.5 million plus 3-6% royalties, SPH's first overseas license-out.

Oct 20, 2026

Sphatika bhasma

Sphatika bhasma, also called Shubhra or Fitkari bhasma, is an Ayurvedic calcined potash alum preparation used for wounds, bleeding, vitiligo, and erysipelas, with small clinical and in vitro antimicrobial studies.

Sphenoid bone

Sphenoid bone (os sphenoidale): unpaired wedge-shaped midline skull-base bone with body, greater and lesser wings, pterygoid processes; sella turcica, sphenoidal sinus, foramina ovale, rotundum, spinosum, optic canal.

Sphenopalatine ganglion block

Sphenopalatine ganglion block is a regional nerve block that delivers local anesthetic near the sphenopalatine ganglion, mainly to abort cluster headache attacks and relieve migraine and facial pain.

Spherocytosis

Hereditary spherocytosis (Minkowski-Chauffard disease), congenital spherocytic hemolytic anemia: inherited red cell membrane protein defects (ANK1, spectrin, band 3) causing spherical fragile red cells, anemia, jaundice, splenomegaly; treated by splenectomy.

Spheroid body myopathy

Spheroid body myopathy, a rare autosomal dominant myofibrillar myopathy (OMIM 609200, ORPHA 268129) caused by MYOT myotilin mutations, marked by proximal weakness and spheroid body inclusions on muscle biopsy.

Sphincter

A sphincter is a ring-shaped muscle that relaxes or tightens to open and close passages in the body, controlling the flow of food, urine, and stool.

Sphincterotomy

Sphincterotomy is an endoscopic procedure that cuts the biliary sphincter with high-frequency current, usually during ERCP, most often to treat gallstones lodged in the common bile duct.

Sphygmomanometry

Sphygmomanometry is the indirect measurement of arterial blood pressure with an inflatable cuff, a pressure gauge, and a stethoscope or automated sensor, yielding systolic and diastolic values.

SPICE STEMI trial

SPICE STEMI (NCT07149961) is a completed Indonesian randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial of curcumin 390 mg plus piperine 20 mg daily for 28 days after PPCI in 50 STEMI patients, measuring hsCRP and MDA; no results posted.

Spider angioma

Spider angioma (spider nevus, nevus araneus, spider telangiectasia): a benign skin lesion with a central dilated arteriole and radiating capillaries; common in pregnancy and a marker of liver disease when multiple.

Spigelian hernia

Spigelian hernia (lateral ventral hernia): protrusion through the spigelian fascia along the semilunar line. Rare (0.12-2% of abdominal wall hernias), high incarceration risk, repaired surgically with mesh.

Spike-timing-dependent plasticity

Spike-timing-dependent plasticity (STDP), a Hebbian synaptic learning rule: pre-before-post spiking within roughly 10–100 ms windows drives LTP, reverse order drives LTD; found at over 20 synapse types from insects to humans.

Spina bifida

Spina bifida is a neural tube defect in which the spine fails to close in early pregnancy. Types include occulta, meningocele, and myelomeningocele; folic acid prevents most cases, and fetal surgery improves outcomes.

Spinal anaesthesia

Spinal anaesthesia: injection of local anaesthetic into subarachnoid cerebrospinal fluid to numb the lower body. First performed by August Bier in 1898 with cocaine; commonest complications are postdural puncture headache and hypotension.

Spinal arteriovenous metameric syndrome

Spinal arteriovenous metameric syndrome, also called Cobb syndrome or SAMS 1-31, is a rare non-hereditary disorder with arteriovenous malformations of spinal cord, bone, muscle, and skin in the same metamere, treated by embolization, surgery, steroids, and trametinib.