nosophobia
Sign in to saveAlso known as Fear of disease, disease phobia, illness anxiety disorder
Nosophobia, also known as disease phobia or illness anxiety disorder, is the irrational fear of contracting a disease, a type of specific phobia. Primary fears of this kind are fear of contracting HIV infection (AIDS phobia or HIV serophobia), pulmonary tuberculosis (phthisiophobia), sexually transmitted infections (syphilophobia or venereophobia), cancer (carcinophobia), heart diseases (cardiophobia), COVID-19 (coronaphobia), and catching the common cold or flu.
Key facts
- Medical condition (new).name
- Nosophobia
- Medical condition (new).field
- Psychiatry
via Wikipedia infobox
~7 min read
Encyclopedic overview
15 sectionsContents
- Signs and symptoms
- Possible causes
- Psychodynamic theory
- Media influences
- Family history
- Treatments
- Behavioral treatment
- Cognitive therapy
- Medical reassurance
- Differential diagnoses
- Hypochondriasis
- Prevalence
- See also
- References
- External links
Nosophobia, also known as disease phobia or illness anxiety disorder, is the irrational fear of contracting a disease, a type of specific phobia. Primary fears of this kind are fear of contracting HIV infection (AIDS phobia or HIV serophobia), pulmonary tuberculosis (phthisiophobia), sexually transmitted infections (syphilophobia or venereophobia), cancer (carcinophobia), heart diseases (cardiophobia), COVID-19 (coronaphobia), and catching the common cold or flu.
The word nosophobia comes from the Greek νόσος nosos for "disease" and φόβος, phobos, "fear".
Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “nosophobia” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.