hemorrhage

1 of 2

noun

hem·or·rhage ˈhem-rij

ˈhe-mə-

medical : a copious or heavy discharge of blood from the blood vessels

a cerebral hemorrhage

postpartum hemorrhage

stop the hemorrhage

: a rapid and uncontrollable loss or outflow

a financial hemorrhage

hemorrhagic

ˌhe-mə-ˈra-jik

adjective

hemorrhage

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verb

hemorrhaged; hemorrhaging

intransitive verb

: to undergo heavy or uncontrollable bleeding

began to hemorrhage after the surgery

transitive verb

: to lose rapidly and uncontrollably

The company is hemorrhaging money.

Did you know?

A hemorrhage usually results from either a severe blow to the body or from medication being taken for something else. Though many hemorrhages aren't particularly serious, those that occur in the brain (cerebral hemorrhages) can be life-threatening. In older people, hemorrhages are often caused by blood-thinning medication taken to prevent heart attacks. A bruise (or hematoma) is a hemorrhage close enough to the surface of the skin to be visible. Hemorrhage is also a verb, which isn't always used to talk about actual blood; thus, we may hear that a business is hemorrhaging money, or that the U.S. has been hemorrhaging industrial jobs for decades. Be careful when writing hemorrhage; it's not an easy word to spell.

Example Sentences

Noun The patient suffered a cerebral hemorrhage. There is a possibility of hemorrhage with the procedure. Verb The patient began to hemorrhage after the surgery.

Recent Examples on the Web

Noun

But some Chinese news outlets managed to interview relatives of Changfeng Hospital patients, who described an elderly father who had been there since last summer because of disabilities after a cerebral hemorrhage, and another man, 76, who had no motor skills and lived there full time. —

Joy Dong, New York Times, 8 May 2023 After having a brain hemorrhage while on a spring break trip to Mexico last month, Liza Burke, a senior at the University of Georgia, was diagnosed with a brain tumor. —

Staff Author, Peoplemag, 12 Apr. 2023 Even as white and Hispanic Texans saw their rates of severe hemorrhage decline over recent years, the rate for Black women rose. —

Allie Morris, Dallas News, 15 Dec. 2022 An intracerebral hemorrhage is when blood from an artery suddenly begins to bleed into the brain. —

Jen Christensen, CNN, 7 Dec. 2022 In addition, her 6-year-old daughter, Remy, had been born with shoulder dystocia, when one of the baby’s shoulders gets stuck — a birth injury that can leave a baby with damage and a mother with grave maternal complications, including postpartum hemorrhage. —

Stephanie Ebbert, BostonGlobe.com, 7 Oct. 2022 Researchers will look for swelling or hemorrhage of the brain tissue possibly caused by microgravity. —

cleveland, 28 Apr. 2022 His cause of death in April 2021 was hemorrhage of an ulcer in his small intestine, according to a Gwinnett County Medical Examiner report. —

Jeremy Redmon The Atlanta Journal-constitution (tns), al, 18 Apr. 2023 He’s lived with Type 1 diabetes since childhood; suffered a brain hemorrhage in 2010; had a hole in his heart repaired in 2011; and underwent kidney surgery in 2014. —

Melissa Ruggieri, USA TODAY, 15 Mar. 2023

Verb

Alex Shephard, The New Republic, 11 May 2023 Now, Mayor Karen Bass wants to rebuild the force Over the past three years, the LAPD has hemorrhaged officers. —

David Lauter, Los Angeles Times, 19 Apr. 2023 That has made profitability a near impossibility for the bank, which has been hemorrhaging money for years. —

Nathaniel Meyersohn, CNN, 16 Mar. 2023 The study, published in the New England Journal of Medicine, investigated ways to detect and reduce the prevalence of postpartum hemorrhages — the leading cause of maternal mortality worldwide and the second-leading cause in the U.S., behind mental health conditions. —

Julianne Mcshane, NBC News, 10 May 2023 In recent weeks, the bank hemorrhaged more than $100 billion in deposits. —

Rachel Siegel, Washington Post, 1 May 2023 Miami-Dade continued to hemorrhage residents but that loss was overcome by the nation's biggest influx of international migration. —

Mike Schneider, USA TODAY, 9 Apr. 2023 After months of filming, and with the production hemorrhaging money, Fox finally recalled the principals from London, knowing the movie was unfinished. —

Chris Klimek, Smithsonian Magazine, 27 Mar. 2023 Reality Labs’ operating loss has grown steadily since 2019, hemorrhaging $4.28 billion in the last three months of 2022, and $13.72 billion during the entire year. —

Prarthana Prakash, Fortune, 5 Apr. 2023 See More

These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'hemorrhage.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.