acuto-, acut-, acuti-, acu-, -cusis; also, agu-

The condition of being chilly and feverish: After being examined by Dr. Smart, Jane was told to go home, go to bed, and take the special medicine to recover from her aguishness.

1. Clever; sharp; shrewd; The trick he played on his sister was cute and effective, but he could only do it once.
2. Pretty, attractive; descriptive of a pleasing and youthful appearance: The doll that Lynn got for Christmas was so cute with big blue eyes, a large head with golden locks of hair, and the doll looked so innocent and fragile!
3. Etymology: cute was originally a shortened form of acute in the sense of being "keenly perceptive or discerning, shrewd".

It is considered likely that cute came to be used as a term of praise, or approval, for things that demonstrated "acuteness", and so it went on to develop its own sense of being "attractive" and "fetching".

The increased sharpness of sense perceptions: When Anita went to the ophthalmologist's office for a regular check-up, she was diagnosed as having hyperacuity, which was better than twenty-twenty vision!

1. Abnormal sensitivity to some sounds, sometimes resulting in pain even when only moderately loud sounds are in the area of the subject: Brett had been diagnosed with hyperacusia which made his job of monitoring crowds at band concerts too difficult for him to tolerate any more because the noise of the crowds and the music of the bands were too painful for his ears.

Deafness is not the only danger of noise exposure of hyperacusia, in fact stress causes some 45,000 fatal heart attacks a year in the developing world, according to researcher Dieter Schwela of the Stockholm Environment Institute.

2. Increased sharpness of hearing or a condition that exists when sounds are perceived as abnormally loud: Although Caroline always wanted to attend a live concert with her favorite band, she was advised not to do so because of the hyperacusia in her ears which would make going to the concert a terribly painful experience.

Decreased sharpness of sense perception: Since Jane noticed a change in her hearing, she decided to go to the otorhinolaryngologist for a checkup and found out that she couldn't hear as well as before, and he diagnosed her condition as being a case of hypoacuity.

Relating to a disease which is very very sharp or violent: The veterinary told James that his cat evidently had eaten something toxic and was suffering from a peracute infection, but would probably survive.

1. An acute febrile state with chills: Shaking ague can be a fit of fever accompainied by shivering and by pains in the joints and bones.
2. In medicine, an obsolete term for the severe form of malarial paroxysm: Shaking ague can be a violent attack of sickness which may be due to the sudden occurrence of symptoms, or the acute exacerbation, or the abrupt worsening, of preexisting symptoms.

Less than acute, or referring to a disease or other abnormal condition which is present in a person who appears to be clinically well:

A subacute ailment may be identified or discovered with a laboratory test or radiologic examination.

The term subacute is used in contrast to "acute", which indicates "a very sudden onset or a rapid change", and "chronic" that indicates "an indefinite period of time or no change".

In ancient Greece, the "father of medicine", Hippocrates, distinguished diseases that were "acute" (abrupt, sharp and brief) from those that were "chronic" (sn illness or pain which is serious and that lasts for a long time). His diagnosis is still being applied in these modern times.

Subacute has been coined to designate the mid-ground between acute and chronic.

Extremely acute: A superacute pain is very strong and sharp and marked by an extreme severity of symptoms and fast progress, such as certain diseases.