The rhetoric of health and medicine (or medical rhetoric) is an academic discipline concerning language and symbols in health and medicine.[1] Rhetoric most commonly refers to the persuasive element in human interactions and is often best studied in the specific situations in which it occurs.[2] As a subfield of rhetoric, medical rhetoric specifically analyzes and evaluates the structure, delivery, and intention of communications messages in medicine- and health-related contexts. Primary topics of focus includes patient-physician communication, health literacy, language that constructs disease knowledge, and pharmaceutical advertising (including both direct-to-consumer and direct-to-physician advertising). The general research areas are described below.