Injection

How to spell injection

9 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce injection

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does injection mean?

1. nounThe act of forcing a liquid, especially a medicine or vaccine, into the body using a needle and syringe.
2. nounThe act of introducing something new, such as money, energy, or fuel, into a system.

Injection in a sentence

• The nurse prepared the injection before the patient sat down.

• The company survived thanks to a large cash injection from investors.

• A single injection of the vaccine gave several months of protection.

• The new manager brought a welcome injection of energy to the team.

Where does injection come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word traces back to the Latin verb injicere, meaning 'to throw in' or 'to put into', formed from the prefix in- ('into') and jacere ('to throw'). The past participle injectus gave rise to the noun injectio, describing the act of casting or putting something in. English adopted the word in the 1500s, at first for the general idea of forcing or introducing one thing into another, and it later became firmly attached to the medical practice of driving fluid into the body with a syringe. The same jacere root powers a whole family of relatives, including 'project' (throw forward), 'eject' (throw out) and 'reject' (throw back), so remembering the spelling 'ject' anchors all of them. The tricky part for writers is purely the ending: it is spelled -tion, not the -ction or -shun a careful speaker might expect.

How the word is built

• in- (into)
• ject (throw)
• -ion (noun-forming suffix)