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Glite Dictionary
barium meal

barium meal

1 5.1
A test where you swallow barium so doctors can X-ray your stomach and food pipe
  • noun
  • /ˈbɛəriəm miːl/
  • Specialized
translation icon : bario
  • During the procedure, the technician explained that the barium meal would highlight any abnormalities in my intestines.

Examples

  • Before the X-ray, I had to drink a barium meal to help visualize my stomach.

  • The doctor recommended a barium meal test to examine my digestive tract.

  • Barium meal study was unremarkable.

    Academic text (2007)

Synonyms

GI series
vsbarium meal
  • Specialized
1 6.7

An X-ray test of the stomach and intestines after drinking a barium solution

is the specific test using a swallowed opaque contrast solution for imaging

How Invasive

surgery
945 2.7
endoscopy
  • Specialized
7 5.8
GI series
  • Specialized
1 6.7
barium meal
  • Specialized
1 5.1
physical
  • US
49 3.2

Surface Forms

barium meal singular
barium meals plural

Morphology

barium + meal

Knowing 'barium' (a chemical used in medicine) and 'meal' (food) allows a learner to infer that the phrase involves ingesting barium, so there is a clear compositional cue. However, the specific meaning 'a diagnostic X‑ray test of the digestive tract' is a specialized, clinical sense that is not fully predictable from everyday uses of 'meal', making the expression only partially transparent to a B1 learner.

Etymology

Barium meal comes from the simple image of drinking a special white liquid: barium is a chalky substance that shows up clearly on an X-ray and meal is what the patient swallows. The barium coats the inside of the stomach like white paint so the X-ray can 'see' the shape and find problems, so barium meal means 'a medical test where you swallow barium so doctors can see your stomach on an X-ray'.