Family


Family: 1. A group of individuals related by blood or marriage or by a feeling of closeness. 2. A biological classification of related plants or animals that is a division below the order and above the genus. 3. A group of genes related in structure and in function that descended from an ancestral gene. 4. A group of gene products similarly related in structure and function and of shared genetic descent. 5. Parents and their children. The most fundamental social group in humans.

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  • Family history

    Family history: The family structure and relationships within the family, including information about diseases in family members. Family history provides a ready view of problems or illnesses within the family and facilitates analysis of inheritance or familial patterns.

  • Family medicine

    Family medicine: Also called family practice. The medical specialty which provides continuing and comprehensive health care for the individual and family. It is the specialty in breadth which integrates the biological, clinical, and behavioral sciences. The scope of family practice encompasses all ages, both sexes, each organ system, and every disease entity. (From the American […]

  • Family physician

    Family physician: A physician who is educated and trained in family practice. “Family physicians possess unique attitudes, skills, and knowledge which qualify them to provide continuing and comprehensive medical care, health maintenance and preventive services to each member of the family regardless of sex, age or type of problem, be it biological, behavioral, or social. […]

  • Family planning, natural

    Family planning, natural: Also known as fertility awareness, periodic abstinence and the rhythm method, this approach entails not having sexual intercourse on the days of a woman’s menstrual cycle when she is most likely to become pregnant or using a barrier method (such as a condom, the diaphragm or a cervical cap) for birth control […]

  • Family practice

    Family practice: The medical specialty which provides continuing and comprehensive health care for the individual and family. It is the specialty in breadth which integrates the biological, clinical, and behavioral sciences. The scope of family practice encompasses all ages, both sexes, each organ system, and every disease entity. (From the American Academy of Family Physicians)


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