cirugía
nounCEFR B1
What does “cirugía” mean in English?
surgery — a surgical procedure or the field of surgery; formal register
surgery — a surgical procedure or the field of surgery; formal register (colloquial: una operación); operarse (reflexive) — to have surgery
Example sentences
El traumatólogo le explicó que si la fisioterapia no daba resultado en dos meses, habría que plantearse una cirugía para reparar el cartílago dañado.
The orthopaedic surgeon explained that if physiotherapy did not yield results in two months, they would have to consider surgery to repair the damaged cartilage.
Se operó de la rodilla el año pasado y, aunque la cirugía fue bien, la recuperación fue más larga de lo que esperaba.
She had knee surgery last year, and although the surgery went well, the recovery was longer than she expected.
How to use it
Cirugía (feminine: la cirugía) refers to surgery as both a procedure (una cirugía, una intervención quirúrgica) and the medical field (la cirugía general, la cirugía estética). The more colloquial term for a single operation is una operación. Operarse (reflexive) means to have surgery: me voy a operar mañana. Ser operado/a is the passive voice construction. Register: cirugía is formal–clinical; operación is neutral; operarse is informal-spoken.
Common mistake
Do not conflate operación and cirugía — they are interchangeable in casual speech but cirugía is the formal written-register term. Also note that la cirugía can refer to the field (I studied cirugía) or a single operation — context is key.