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At the Doctor's: English for Health & Illness
English for the doctor's office: make an appointment, describe your symptoms, understand the doctor, and get your prescription — with common mistakes.
A visit to the doctor follows a clear order: you make an appointment, you describe how you feel, the doctor asks questions and gives advice, and you pick up any medicine. Knowing the usual phrase for each step means one less thing to think about when you're not at your best.
Making an appointment
Call the clinic or the front desk and say why you're coming in.
Describing your symptoms
English usually says I have a… for an ailment, or My … hurts for a body part.
A handy idiom: I feel under the weather means "a bit ill" — good when you can't name one exact symptom.
Common ailments
A few everyday words you'll hear and use:
What the doctor says
Recognizing these questions and instructions helps you follow the conversation.
At the pharmacy: you may need a prescription, painkillers, or cough syrup — often twice a day after meals.
Common mistakes
"I have pain in my head." English prefers the fixed word headache.
✓I have a headache.
"I feel myself bad." Feel takes no reflexive here.
✓I feel bad today. / I don't feel well.
"I am ill of a cold." Use have for an illness.
✓I have a cold.
Quick exercise
Complete each line with one word.
- I'd like to make an ___ .
- I have a ___ throat.
- I feel ___ the weather.
- Take this twice a ___ .
- The doctor gave me a ___ .
Answer key
- appointment (make an appointment)
- sore (a sore throat)
- under (under the weather = a bit ill)
- day (twice a day)
- prescription (the note for your medicine)
Practice this in Recursio
You don't want to search for words when you're not feeling well, so this is vocabulary worth having ready. Save the phrases you'd actually use to your word list in Recursio, and spaced review can bring "I have a sore throat" and "make an appointment" back so they're easier to recall.
Build your word list in Recursio → · Free to start, on iOS and Android.