phocomelicadj.n.

1904 Lancet 6 Aug. 407/1 Teratological dwarfs were phocomelic where parts of the limbs were absent, micromelic where limbs were complete but unduly small, and nanosomes (or true dwarfs).

1935 Proc. Royal Soc. B. 118 134 The extreme abnormalities of bone formation shown by the extremities of phokomelic homozygous Creeper embryos.

1942 Jrnl. Exper. Zool. 89 104 These transplants differentiated into ‘phocomelic’ limbs.

1959 Jrnl. Exper. Zool. 142 635 The lethal period of phocomelics.

1962 Lancet 1 Dec. 1155/2 No firm rule should guide schooling for phocomelic children.

1978 Time 20 Feb. 69/3 Children who are born legless or armless, their limbs amputated by a tangled umbilical cord, are sometimes hard to tell from true phocomelics, or seal-children, with vestigial hands and feet attached directly to the torso.

1984 A. Hailey Strong Medicine xi. 91 Now, suddenly there were dozens of phocomelic babies.

2003 Jrnl. Hand Surg. 28B 215/2 We have found that it may be difficult to differentiate and identify the bones that are present in a phocomelic limb.