Meaning & use
stabilize
Last updated
Meanings
verbtransitive
To make something firm and steady, so that it no longer shakes, falls or changes suddenly.
Grammar: Takes an object: they stabilized the bridge.
Patterns
- stabilize something
- stabilize something with something
Workers stabilized the leaning tower with steel cables.
The pilot stabilized the plane after the turbulence.
She stabilized the ladder by propping it against the wall.
verbintransitive
To become steady and stop changing, especially after a period of trouble.
Grammar: No object: prices stabilized.
Patterns
- something stabilizes
The patient's condition stabilized overnight.
Prices stabilized after months of sharp rises.
His moods finally stabilized after he changed his medication.
verbtransitivemedical
To treat a person who is seriously hurt or ill so that their condition stops getting worse.
Grammar: Takes a patient as an object: stabilize the patient.
Patterns
- stabilize a patient
Paramedics stabilized the injured driver at the scene.
Doctors worked for hours to stabilize the child.
The first aim in an emergency is to stabilize the patient.
Word forms
| third person singular | stabilizes |
|---|---|
| past tense | stabilized |
| past participle | stabilized |
| -ing form | stabilizing |
Common combinations
- stabilize the economy
- The bank cut rates to stabilize the economy.
- stabilize prices
- The government tried to stabilize prices.
- stabilize a patient
- Nurses stabilized the patient before surgery.
- stabilize the situation
- Police worked to stabilize the situation.
- begin to stabilize
- His breathing began to stabilize.
Synonyms and how they differ
- steady
- Steady is plainer and often describes calming something shaky, like a hand or a voice.
- settle
- Settle means to become calm or fixed after movement and is used more casually.
- secure
- Secure means to make safe from falling or loss, rather than to end change.
- balance
- Balance suggests equal weight on all sides, which is narrower than stabilize.
Opposites
Word family
- stable adjective
- firm, steady and not likely to change
- stability noun
- the state of being steady
- stabilization noun
- the process of becoming steady
- stabilizer noun
- something that keeps a thing steady
- destabilize verb
- to make unstable
Commonly confused: stabilize or sterilize?
stabilize vs sterilize
Sterilize means to make free of germs, or to make unable to have children, and is unrelated to being steady.
Practice
The doctors worked quickly to ____ the patient before moving him to another hospital.
Choose one answer.
Stabilize means to stop a patient's condition from getting worse. Dismiss, rename and promote do not describe medical care.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “stabilize”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.