cryptogeneticadj.
/ˌkrɪptə(ʊ)dʒᵻˈnɛtɪk/, U.S. /ˌkrɪptədʒəˈnɛdɪk/ Of unknown or undetermined origin, cause, or ancestry; (Medicine) = cryptogenic adj. 1 Cf. cryptogenous adj.
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the world > health and disease > ill health > a disease > production of disease > [adjective] > unknown cause
cryptogenous1862
cryptogenic1873
cryptogenetic1882
agnogenic1940
1882 London Med. Rec. 15 Feb. 54/2 Leube, in 1878.., called attention to two cases of septicæmia, which he termed cryptogenetic; that is to say, of which the origin was unknown, or could not be discovered.
1908 R. Park Mod. Surg. I. 87 Cryptogenetic or spontaneous septicemia is a term applied to those cases in which the port of entry of the germs is no longer visible—e.g., a hypodermic puncture—or cannot be positively determined.
1954 Ecology 35 102/1 Hupe seems unhappy with the problem of the general evolution of this polyphylogenetic, cryptogenetic, group.
1962 Lancet 27 Jan. 190/1 All cases of liver cirrhosis which cannot be ascribed to abuse of alcohol, occlusive processes of the bile ducts, or hæmochromatosis will be referred to as ‘cryptogenetic cirrhosis of the liver’.
1993 E. N. K. Clarkson Invertebr. Palaeontol. & Evol. (ed. 3) xi. 373/2 After their extinction came the first representatives of the important and dominant Ordovician groups: the Asaphoidea, Phacopida, Trinucleina and others,..most of them of cryptogenetic origin.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, June 2011; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
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adj.1882