How to Write 痊 (quán) — Meaning “recover; heal”

Imagine a person who was sick (疒) lying in bed, but now they are completely (全) healthy and can get up. The left part looks like a sickbed, and the right part 全 sounds like "whole"—so think "whole after sickness."

Write the radical 疒 first: dot, horizontal left-falling stroke, then the inside part. For 全, start with the top 'person' radical (人) – left-falling and right-falling, then the horizontal line and the bottom king (王). A common mistake is making the 全 too wide or forgetting that the 疒 radical's dots and strokes should enclose the right side properly.

All three share the 疒 radical, but 疣 (yóu) means a wart or a growth on the skin, and 疤 (bā) means a scar from a wound. In contrast, 痊 specifically means to recover or heal completely from an illness, not a skin condition. Visually, 痊 has 全 on the right, while 疣 has 尤 and 疤 has 巴.

痊 is used in formal or medical contexts, most often in the word 痊愈 (quányù) meaning "fully recover" (e.g., 他已经痊愈了 – he has fully recovered). It is less common in daily speech than 好 (hǎo) for recovery, but appears in hospital records or announcements. In traditional Chinese culture, recovery is seen as restoring balance, and 痊 carries a positive sense of wholeness.

Common words containing 痊 include: 痊愈 (quán yù) — fully recover; 痊可 (quán kě) — recover from illness; 痊复 (quán fù) — recover; recuperate.