What is the root for the spleen?

• A. ren/o
• B. gastr/o
• C. spleno-
• D. splen/o

Answer: (D)

The concept being tested is how medical terms are built from a root and a combining form. For the spleen, the base meaning is spleen, and when you connect it to suffixes, you use the combining form splen/o. This form is what you see in many spleen-related terms, like splenomegaly or splenectomy, where the o-vowel helps link the root to the suffix.

Other options refer to different organs or to a variant form used in some terms. ren/o means kidney, gastr/o means stomach, and spleno- is another way the spleen can appear in terms but functions more as a prefix form in longer word-building. The combining form splen/o is the standard linking element you’d use to form the common spleen-related terms, which is why it’s the correct root to identify here.