valetudinarian
/ˌvalɪtjuːdɪˈnɛːrɪən
/noun
1A person who is unduly anxious about their health.Emma, a clever, pretty, and self-satisfied young woman, is the daughter, and mistress of the house, of Mr Woodhouse, an amiable old valetudinarian....
- The English people are a nation of valetudinarians, but there is not sufficient nutriment in their food, which seems to consist mainly of chilled meat.
- I replied by giving him a full, complete, and accurate history of my ailments, after the manner of valetudinarians.
Synonyms
hypochondriac, neurotic, invalid, valetudinary;
French malade imaginaire
archaic melancholico
1.1A person suffering from poor health.Here are always to be seen a great number of valetudinarians from the West Indies, seeking for the renovation of health, exhausted by the debilitating nature of their sun, air, and modes of living....
- A trickle of visitors soon turned to a flood and the Silesian peasant was, by the beginning of the 1840s, personally ministering to hundreds of valetudinarians a year.
- The group highly recommended with the vaccination include citizens above 60 years old, people with chronic diseases, valetudinarians, medical workers, primary school students and kindergartners.
adjective
1Showing undue concern about one’s health: the valetudinarian English...
- In their fascinating and eloquent valetudinarian correspondence, Adams and Jefferson had a great deal to say about religion.
Synonyms
hypochondriac, self-obsessed, neurotic, obsessed with one's health;
sickly, ailing, poorly, in poor health, weak, feeble, frail, delicate, debilitated, invalid, bedridden, infirm, washed out, run down, valetudinary
archaic splenetic
rare hipped, hippish
1.1Suffering from poor health.Diseases cannot be cured by mummifying the valetudinarian victim's mortal vessel in bandages.
Derivatives
valetudinarianism
- Theatre exists in such an eternally precarious state of valetudinarianism that observers keep predicting its imminent demise.
- Personally I don't need an absolute to enable me to distinguish between, say, the good of kindness and the evil of slander, or the good of health and the evil of valetudinarianism.
- These monuments to Victorian valetudinarianism were packed with patented paraphernalia such as exercise machines and weightlifting contraptions.
Origin
Early 18th century: from Latin valetudinarius 'in ill health' (from valetudo 'health', from valere 'be well') + -an.