the loss, esp by conscious suppression, of one or more sounds or letters at the beginning of a word, e.g. in bus for omnibus, cute for acute, ‘cos for because: compare aphesis
a medical technique for removing a component, e.g. plasma, from the blood, and returning the blood to the donor
aphaeretic /afəʹretik/ adj
[via late Latin from Greek aphairesis, literally ‘taking off’, from aphairein to take away]