Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • adjective Tending to alter or produce alteration.
  • adjective Tending to restore to normal health.
  • noun A treatment or medication that restores health.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • Causing alteration; having the power or tendency to alter; especially, in medicine, having the power to restore the healthy functions of the body.
  • noun One of a group of medicines the physiological action of which is somewhat obscure, but which seem to modify the processes of growth and repair in the various tissues. The most important are the compounds of mercury, iodine, and arsenic.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • adjective Causing ateration.
  • noun A medicine or treatment which gradually induces a change, and restores healthy functions without sensible evacuations.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • adjective tending to cure or restore to health

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Latin alterativum, noun use of alterativus.

Support

Help support Wordnik (and make this page ad-free) by adopting the word alterative.

Examples

Comments

Log in or sign up to get involved in the conversation. It's quick and easy.