Word
Lekarz rozmawia z pacjentem przed operacją.
Meaning
The doctor talks with the patient before the surgery.
Part of speech
sentence
Pronunciation
Course
Lesson
Breakdown of Lekarz rozmawia z pacjentem przed operacją.
rozmawiać
to talk
lekarz
doctor
z
with
pacjent
the patient (m)
Questions & Answers about Lekarz rozmawia z pacjentem przed operacją.
Why does operacją have that -ą ending?
It is in the Instrumental case. In Polish, the preposition przed (when talking about time, like "before") requires the noun following it to be in the Instrumental case. Since the base word is operacja (a feminine noun ending in -a), it changes to operacją.
Do both z and przed in this sentence take the Instrumental case?
Yes! The preposition z (when it means "with") takes the Instrumental case, which gives us z pacjentem. The preposition przed (meaning "before") also takes the Instrumental case, giving us przed operacją. It is very common to see multiple prepositions triggering the same case in a single sentence.
If pacjentem and operacją are both in the same case, why do their endings look so different?
The ending depends on the noun's gender. Pacjent is a masculine noun, and masculine nouns usually take the -em (or -iem) ending in the Instrumental case. Operacja is a feminine noun, and feminine nouns ending in -a change that -a to -ą.
Could I use mówi instead of rozmawia here?