Question
An operative report uses the term "cholecystectomy" and a new coder wants to break it down instead of memorizing it as a whole word. How should the coder split this term into its parts, and what happens to the connecting vowel when the suffix already starts with a vowel?
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The term splits into the root chol/e (gall, bile) plus cyst (bladder, sac) plus the suffix -ectomy (surgical removal), giving "removal of the gallbladder." The combining vowel (usually -o-) is inserted between a root and a consonant-starting suffix or another root to ease pronunciation, but it is dropped whenever the following suffix already begins with a vowel, which is exactly why -ectomy attaches directly rather than becoming -o-ectomy. A coder who memorizes this dropping rule, rather than the whole word, can correctly parse unfamiliar compound terms built the same way instead of guessing at their meaning.
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