Body Parts and Health Vocabulary in Japanese: 体, 痛い, and the が-Pattern

Body parts and health vocabulary in Japanese are N5 basics. They turn 体 (からだ, "the body"), 痛い (いたい, "painful"), and a short list of illness words into the survival kit you need the first time you fall sick abroad.¹² These are not advanced terms: a real university student-health guide builds its symptoms section on body-part nouns plus 痛い, 熱, 風邪, 薬, and 病院.²

Overview

This article covers three things: the core body-part list with kanji, kana, and readings; the illness and symptom words a beginner needs; and the ～が痛い sensation pattern that lets you say what hurts and answer a doctor's questions.

Some Japanese examples reach into N4 territory when the grammar calls for it, but the main forms stay at N5. The explanations are written for beginners.

Why body and health vocabulary is N5 survival vocabulary

These are the words you need the first time you get sick abroad. The clinic phrasebook is built almost entirely on body-part nouns plus 痛い, 熱, 風邪, 薬, and 病院.²

A Japanese university student-health guide builds its whole symptoms section on [body part] が痛いです, 熱があります, and 薬がほしいです. That confirms these are core forms, not advanced material.²

The grammar that supports them is N5 too. 痛い is an N5 い-adjective,³ and 体 (からだ), 目 (め), 口 (くち), and 足 (あし) are standard N5 nouns.¹⁴

Native (和語) vs. Sino-Japanese (漢語) health words

Japanese health words often come in pairs. This split mirrors the broader vocabulary strata of the language. 和語 (native vocabulary) typically uses kun-readings, sounds softer, and is the default in casual speech. 漢語 (Sino-Japanese vocabulary) uses on-readings and carries a more formal, precise, clinical tone.⁵

This split runs through almost every word in the article. The same body part or symptom often has a soft everyday word and a clinical Sino-Japanese twin.

A practical rule works across these pairs: the 和語 word is the one you say, and the 漢語 word is the one you read on a form or hear from staff.⁵

Say the soft word, read the clinical one

When you are speaking, default to the 和語 member of each pair (お腹, 頭が痛い, 医者). Save the 漢語 twin (腹部, 頭痛, 医師) for recognizing it on an intake form or in a staff member's question.⁵

Core body-part vocabulary

This is the reference list most readers come for. Japanese body-part nouns do not change for number, so 耳 covers both "ear" and "ears" with no change.⁶

Head and face (頭, 顔, 目, 鼻, 口, 耳, 歯)

Kanji	Kana	Romaji	English	Note
頭	あたま	atama	head	core seven; N5.14
顔	かお	kao	face	kun reading.6
目	め	me	eye	single-mora reading; standard.64
鼻	はな	hana	nose	homophone with 花 (flower) in isolation; context disambiguates.6
口	くち	kuchi	mouth	N5 kanji.64
耳	みみ	mimi	ear(s)	covers singular and plural alike.64
歯	は	ha	tooth / teeth	single-mora は; drives 歯が痛いです.62

Two of these readings can look too short to trust. 目 め and 歯 は are each a single mora, but both are the standard standalone noun readings. If you second-guess them, your first guess was probably right.⁶

Torso and internal (お腹, 背中, 肩, 胸, 喉)

Kanji	Kana	Romaji	English	Note
お腹 / 腹	おなか / はら	onaka / hara	belly, stomach, abdomen	お腹 (おなか) is the everyday form; bare 腹 (はら) is blunter.67
背中	せなか	senaka	back (of the body)	kun reading.6
肩	かた	kata	shoulder	clinic-relevant.62
胸	むね	mune	chest	kun reading.6
喉	のど	nodo	throat	drives 喉が痛い "sore throat".62

The word for "belly" is almost always heard with its お- prefix. The お- on お腹 is 美化語 (bikago, "beautification"), which softens the word rather than honoring a possessor. Bare 腹 sounds coarse or masculine.⁷

Arms, hands, legs, feet (手, 腕, 指, 足, 脚)

Kanji	Kana	Romaji	English	Note
手	て	te	hand	N5 kanji.64
腕	うで	ude	arm	kun reading.6
指	ゆび	yubi	finger / toe (digit)	covers both digits.6
足	あし	ashi	foot; "leg" in everyday use	default kanji for the あし region.684
脚	あし	ashi	leg (hip-to-ankle)	same reading; formal/anatomical kanji.89

The last two rows share a reading and a meaning space that often trips learners up. Both 足 and 脚 read あし. Strictly, 足 denotes the foot from the ankle down, while 脚 denotes the leg from the hip joint down.⁸⁹ In everyday writing, 足 is the default and absorbs both senses. The good-to-know section returns to this point.⁸¹⁰

Illness and symptom vocabulary

These are the words for describing being sick. The 漢語 ache-compounds in the table, 頭痛 and 腹痛, pair directly with the が痛い phrasing taught below.

Common illnesses and symptoms (風邪, 熱, 咳, 鼻水, 頭痛, 腹痛)

Kanji	Kana	Romaji	English	Note
風邪	かぜ	kaze	a cold	collocates with ひく (see below).1112
熱	ねつ	netsu	fever	熱がある / 熱が出る.213
咳	せき	seki	cough	咳が出る "a cough comes out".6
鼻水	はなみず	hanamizu	runny nose	literally "nose-water".6
頭痛	ずつう	zutsū	headache	漢語; pairs with 頭が痛い.5
腹痛	ふくつう	fukutsū	stomachache	漢語; pairs with お腹が痛い.5
病院	びょういん	byōin	hospital / clinic	N5 noun.1
医者	いしゃ	isha	doctor (everyday)	formal doublet 医師 いし.5
薬	くすり	kusuri	medicine	N5 noun.12

The two ache-compounds behave differently from the adjective 痛い. 頭痛 (ずつう) and 腹痛 (ふくつう) are 漢語 compounds built on the on-reading つう of 痛. They are nouns, used with する or ある (頭痛がする, 頭痛がある), and they never conjugate like an adjective.⁵

The set phrases: 風邪をひく and 熱がある

Some illness words pair with a fixed verb, and guessing the verb can produce an unnatural sentence. The two below are the ones a beginner says most.

風邪をひく ("to catch a cold") uses ひく (引く, "to pull / draw in"), not かかる and not なる.¹¹¹² Most other illnesses take 〜にかかる (病気にかかる, インフルエンザにかかる). A cold is the lexical exception.¹²

Why a cold is "pulled," not "caught"

The ひく phrasing reflects an old idea of catching a cold as drawing in (引き込む) bad wind or 邪気 (an evil vapor) from outside into the body. 引く carries that "pull inward" sense.¹¹¹² As a date-anchored note, the spelling 風邪（ふうじゃ）arose in the Kamakura period, while the reading かぜ for 風邪 dates to the Meiji era.¹⁴

The fever phrase works the same way. 熱がある ("to have a fever") marks the fever 熱 with が and uses ある to state that it exists. It does not use です (×熱です) and does not normally use なる.²

Contrast 熱が出る / 熱が出た, which names the onset event ("a fever came on"). ある names the ongoing state.¹³

風邪かぜをひきました。²
"I caught a cold."

熱ねつがあります。²
"I have a fever."

A topic-marking は can replace が here to negate the fever specifically. Keep that contrast in mind for the が-pattern section.

熱ねつはありません。²
"I don't have a fever."

The ～が痛い pattern: saying something hurts

This is the article's main grammar point and the single most useful sentence shape for being sick in Japanese. Learn the frame once, and every body part slots into it.

Structure: [body part] が 痛い

The frame is [body part] + が + 痛い. The body part is marked with が, and 痛い is the predicate adjective. The afflicted part is the grammatical subject of the sensation.²¹⁵

The diagram's lower row is the payoff: ここ ("here") and どこ ("where") drop into the same body-part slot. That is why one pattern covers both your answer and the doctor's question.

頭あたまが痛いたいです。²
"My head hurts."

お腹なかが痛いたいです。²
"My stomach hurts."

喉のどが痛いたいです。²
"My throat hurts."

歯はが痛いたいです。²
"I have a toothache."

Why が and not は or を

The choice of が is not arbitrary, and it is the point most learners get wrong. 痛い is an adjective of sensation, not a transitive verb of action. It has no direct object, so を (which marks the object of a transitive verb) is grammatically unavailable.¹⁵

The thing that hurts is the subject of the sensation predicate, and が marks that subject.¹⁵ In A Dictionary of Basic Japanese Grammar's account, が is the regular marker of the subject of stative predicates. These include adjectives of sensation, emotion, ability, and desire (好き, 欲しい, ～たい).¹⁵

English often renders these patterns with a verb and an object ("my head hurts," "I want X"). For that reason, this が is sometimes called the "objective が," but it is still a subject marker on the experienced thing.¹⁵

は is grammatical, but it changes the meaning

は is possible in the slot, but it shifts the sense to topic or contrast ("as for my head, it hurts"). That is why the neutral, descriptive answer to "where does it hurt" uses が.¹⁵ The clinic source uses は for exactly this contrastive job in 熱はありません "I don't have a fever."²

Conjugating 痛い (痛かった, 痛くない, 痛くなかった)

痛い is a regular い-adjective, so it conjugates by replacing the final い.³ This gives you "it hurt," "it doesn't hurt," and "it didn't hurt" without changing が or the body-part noun.

Form	Plain	Polite	English
Present affirmative	痛い	痛いです	it hurts
Present negative	痛くない	痛くないです / 痛くありません	it doesn't hurt
Past affirmative	痛かった	痛かったです	it hurt
Past negative	痛くなかった	痛くなかったです / 痛くありませんでした	it didn't hurt

The conjugation is mechanical once you see it applied to the が痛い frame.³

昨日きのうは頭あたまが痛いたかったです。³
"My head hurt yesterday."

もう痛いたくないです。³
"It doesn't hurt anymore."

At the doctor: clinic phrases

This is the practical phrasebook. Everything here recombines the words and the が痛い frame already built. That is why a single page can cover a full clinic visit.

The question frame: どこが痛いですか

The doctor's question is the learner's statement turned around. どこ ("where") fills the body-part slot, giving どこが痛いですか ("Where does it hurt?").²

A staff member may instead open with どのような症状がありますか ("what symptoms do you have?"), so it helps to recognize both.²

どのような症状しょうじょうがありますか。²
"What symptoms do you have?"

どこが痛いたいですか。²
"Where does it hurt?"

Survival answers and pointing (ここが痛いです)

When you do not know the word for a body part, point. The point-and-say strategy puts ここ ("here") into the same が痛い frame: ここが痛いです.²

A few support words round out the visit: 予約をする (よやくをする, "make an appointment"), 薬がほしいです (くすりがほしいです, "I'd like some medicine"), 保険証 (ほけんしょう, "insurance card"), and 病院 or クリニック.² Note that 薬がほしい uses the same が-with-stative-adjective pattern. 欲しい is a が-adjective of desire.²¹⁵

ここが痛いたいです。²
"It hurts here."

薬くすりがほしいです。²
"I'd like some medicine."

今日きょう、診察しんさつを受うけたいです。²
"I'd like to see a doctor today."

Good to know

足 vs 脚: foot or leg?

The single spoken word あし is written 足 for the foot (ankle down) and 脚 for the leg (hip-to-ankle). In everyday writing, though, both senses usually collapse onto 足.⁸⁹¹⁰ 脚 also reads きゃく in counters (椅子一脚, "one chair") and is the kanji used for the "legs" of furniture, animals, and insects.⁸⁹

For an N5 learner, the practical rule is short: write 足, and recognize 脚 when it appears in formal or anatomical text.¹⁰

お腹 and the politeness お-prefix on body words

The お- on お腹 (and on お尻 おしり) is 美化語 (bikago), a beautifying prefix that softens the word rather than honoring anyone. おなか is the normal, neutral everyday form.⁷

Bare 腹 (はら) is blunt and sounds rough or masculine, so a learner should default to お腹 in ordinary speech.⁷

頭が痛い vs 頭痛がする: same ache, two registers

頭が痛い is the 和語 adjective phrasing (softer, conversational). 頭痛がする uses the 漢語 noun 頭痛 with する and sounds more clinical.⁵ Both mean "I have a headache," and the same doublet runs 腹痛がする alongside お腹が痛い.⁵

One pairing is wrong: ×頭痛が痛い is redundant, because 痛 already means "ache."⁵ The correct options are 頭が痛い or 頭痛がする, never both glued together.

Talking about someone else's pain: 痛がる

You cannot use bare 痛い to assert another person's inner sensation, because a plain sensation adjective claims direct, first-person knowledge of the feeling.¹⁶ Saying 彼は足が痛いです states someone else's private sensation as fact. That is the wrong form.

The fix is ～がる. It converts the sensation adjective 痛い into an observable "shows signs of being in pain" predicate, used for others and typically in the ～ている form.¹⁶ Note that the object marker shifts to を, because がる behaves like a verb.¹⁶

彼かれは足あしを痛いたがっています。¹⁶
"He looks like his foot hurts."

Mnemonics for the core seven (頭 目 鼻 口 耳 手 足)

These are informal memory hooks, not a sourced pedagogy, so treat them as optional scaffolding for あたま, め, はな, くち, みみ, て, and あし. はな "nose" shares its sound with 花 "flower" (both はな), like a flower in the middle of the face. みみ "ears" doubles the み like two ears. て "hand" is the shortest of the set, fitting for the handiest tool.

See also

• Japanese Emotions and Feelings Vocabulary: 嬉しい, 悲しい, and the ～がる Third-Person Rule
• Japanese Body-Part Idioms: 手, 目, 口, 心 Expressions
• Topic vs. Subject in Japanese: The Hidden Slot
• The は Particle: Topic Marker
• Japanese Family Vocabulary: Kinship Terms and the お-Prefix Asymmetry
• Japanese Colors Vocabulary: The い-Adjective vs. Noun Color Split

References

Footnotes

1. 国立国語研究所 (NINJAL). 『現代日本語書き言葉均衡コーパス』(BCCWJ, Balanced Corpus of Contemporary Written Japanese), 2011. https://clrd.ninjal.ac.jp/bccwj/. Used here as the durable reference for word existence and high-frequency everyday status; not all individual frequency counts are pulled per word. ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵

2. 京都先端科学大学 (Kyoto University of Advanced Science, KUAS). "Japanese Conversation Tips for Visiting a Clinic." Author TOMINAGA Masae, 2024. https://www.kuas.ac.jp/en-jp/wp-content/uploads/sites/6/2024/12/2024_en_Japanese_Conversation_Tips_for_Visiting_a_Clinic.pdf. Verbatim clinic phrases with romaji and English, used as the example source for at-the-doctor lines. ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶ ↩⁷ ↩⁸ ↩⁹ ↩¹⁰ ↩¹¹ ↩¹² ↩¹³ ↩¹⁴ ↩¹⁵ ↩¹⁶ ↩¹⁷ ↩¹⁸ ↩¹⁹ ↩²⁰ ↩²¹ ↩²² ↩²³ ↩²⁴ ↩²⁵ ↩²⁶ ↩²⁷ ↩²⁸ ↩²⁹

3. benkyoumashou.com. "痛い (itai) Japanese Adjective Conjugation." https://benkyoumashou.com/japanese-adjectives/itai/. Confirms 痛い is an い-adjective; full conjugation 痛い / 痛くない / 痛かった / 痛くなかった. (limitation: learning site; conjugation is mechanical and cross-checkable.) ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵

4. NIHONGO ONLINE SCHOOL of Setouchi. "N5 Kanji – body parts 口 | 耳 | 手 | 足 | 目." https://nihongo-online.com/n5-kanji-body-parts/. Places the core body-part kanji in the N5 kanji band. ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶ ↩⁷

5. japanese-language-education.com. 「和語・漢語・外来語・混種語とは？」 https://japanese-language-education.com/goshu/. Definitions of 和語 (native, kun-reading, softer register) vs 漢語 (Sino-Japanese, on-reading, more formal/clinical). (limitation: pedagogy site.) ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶ ↩⁷ ↩⁸ ↩⁹ ↩¹⁰

6. Jisho.org (online Japanese-English dictionary, built on JMdict/EDICT, KANJIDIC2). https://jisho.org. Kanji kun/on readings and core glosses. JMdict/EDICT is the Electronic Dictionary Research and Development Group project; readings cross-checked below. ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶ ↩⁷ ↩⁸ ↩⁹ ↩¹⁰ ↩¹¹ ↩¹² ↩¹³ ↩¹⁴ ↩¹⁵ ↩¹⁶ ↩¹⁷ ↩¹⁸ ↩¹⁹

7. Japanese with Anime (Kanji Box). "お～, ご～, 御～ Honorific Prefix" and "Female Language / bikago 美化語." https://www.japanesewithanime.com/2018/03/honorific-prefix-o-go.html. The お- prefix as 美化語 (beautification) on words such as お腹, contrasted with bare 腹. (limitation: hobbyist reference; corroborated by NINJAL bikago note where possible.) ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴

8. ことくらべ (Kotokurabe). 「【あし】『足』と『脚』と『肢』の違いって？」 https://kotokurabe.com/foot-leg-limb/. The 足 (ankle-down / foot) vs 脚 (hip-to-ankle / leg) kanji split. (limitation: usage-explainer site.) ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶

9. マイナビニュース (Mynavi News). 「『足』と『脚』の違いとは?」 https://news.mynavi.jp/article/20210601-1890706/. Corroborates 足 = foot region / everyday default kanji, 脚 = leg region / formal. ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴

10. 国語力アップ.com. 「足と脚の違いとは？」 https://kokugoryokuup.com/ashi-difference/. Corroborates the あし homophone split and that everyday writing defaults to 足. ↩ ↩² ↩³

11. 雑学ネタ帳 (Zatsuneta). 「病気は『かかる』風邪は『ひく』理由」 https://zatsuneta.com/archives/006237.html. Etymology of 風邪をひく vs 病気にかかる. (limitation: popular reference site, not academic.) ↩ ↩² ↩³

12. 日本経済新聞 (Nihon Keizai Shimbun / Nikkei). 「インフルエンザは『かかる』、風邪はなぜ『ひく』？」 https://www.nikkei.com/article/DGXNASDB08008_Y3A100C1000000/. Reputable broadsheet corroborating the ひく/かかる split and the 風邪 etymology. ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴

13. HiNative (native-speaker Q&A). 「熱がある」vs「熱が出る」 https://hinative.com/questions/2007561. 熱がある = the state of having a fever; 熱が出る/出た = the onset event of a fever developing. (limitation: native-informant Q&A, not a reference work.) ↩ ↩²

14. zatsuneta / Nikkei (see ¹¹, ¹²) for the historical note that 風邪 read as かぜ dates to the Meiji era (明治時代), while the spelling 風邪（ふうじゃ）arose in the Kamakura period (鎌倉時代). ↩

15. Makino, Seiichi & Tsutsui, Michio. A Dictionary of Basic Japanese Grammar. The Japan Times, 1986. The が entry treats が as the marker of the subject of stative predicates (adjectives of sensation, emotion, ability, and the objects of 好き / 欲しい / ～たい), the "objective が" pattern. ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶ ↩⁷

16. Tofugu. "Japanese い-Adjective がる." https://www.tofugu.com/japanese-grammar/i-adjective-garu/. ～がる converts a sensation/emotion adjective (痛い → 痛がる) into an observable third-person form. (limitation: learning blog.) ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴