Complication

How to spell complication

12 letters · 4 syllables

How to pronounce complication

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does complication mean?

1. nounA circumstance or factor that makes a situation more difficult or harder to resolve.
2. nounA secondary condition or problem that develops during or after an illness, injury, or medical procedure.

Complication in a sentence

• The late delivery created a serious complication for the whole project.

• The surgeon warned that infection was a possible complication after the operation.

• A missing signature was the only complication holding up the contract.

• She recovered well, with no complication following the routine procedure.

Where does complication come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word descends from the Latin verb complicare, which meant literally 'to fold together', formed from com- 'together' and plicare 'to fold'. The related noun complicatio described a folding up or entangling, and from that physical image of things folded into one another came the figurative sense of matters being tangled and hard to separate. English took the word in during the early 1600s, by which time it carried the meaning of an entanglement of difficulties rather than literal folds of cloth. The same plicare root quietly survives in a family of everyday relatives such as 'apply', 'imply', 'reply', and 'ply', all of which trace back to that idea of folding or bending. Remembering that the middle is plic, 'fold', helps anchor the single c and the i, since the spelling reflects the Latin fold rather than the way the word is casually spoken.

How the word is built

• com- (together)
• plic (fold)
• -ation (noun of action/result)