Autoinoculation is derived from the Latin root words "autos" and "inoculate" that mean "self implanting" or "self infection" or "implanting something from oneself". Autoinoculation can refer to both beneficial medical procedures (e.g.

vaccination Vaccination is the administration of a vaccine to help the immune system develop immunity from a disease. Vaccines contain a microorganism or virus in a weakened, live or killed state, or proteins or toxins from the organism. In stimulating ...

) as well as non-beneficial or harmful natural processes (e.g.

infection An infection is the invasion of tissues by pathogens, their multiplication, and the reaction of host tissues to the infectious agent and the toxins they produce. An infectious disease, also known as a transmissible disease or communicable dise ...

disease A disease is a particular abnormal condition that negatively affects the structure or function of all or part of an organism, and that is not immediately due to any external injury. Diseases are often known to be medical conditions that a ...

). One beneficial autoinoculation medical procedure is when

cell Cell most often refers to: * Cell (biology), the functional basic unit of life Cell may also refer to: Locations * Monastic cell, a small room, hut, or cave in which a religious recluse lives, alternatively the small precursor of a monastery ...

s are removed from a person's body, medically altered then reinserted ("implanted" or "infected") into the same organism or person again to achieve some diagnostic or treatment aim. For example,

stem cell treatments Stem-cell therapy is the use of stem cells to treat or prevent a disease or condition. , the only established therapy using stem cells is hematopoietic stem cell transplantation. This usually takes the form of a bone-marrow transplantation, but ...

involve the harvesting of stem cells from one's own bone marrow and reintroduction (autoinoculation) of those cells at a later date, sometimes after altering those

stem cells In multicellular organisms, stem cells are undifferentiated or partially differentiated cells that can differentiate into various types of cells and proliferate indefinitely to produce more of the same stem cell. They are the earliest type o ...

. Autoinoculation may also be used for the transplantation of a patient's own healthy bone marrow after recovering from a condition afflicting the tissue. Autoinoculation can also refer to the process by which viruses reproduce themselves within an organism by implanting themselves in an organism's

s, altering the metabolism, DNA repair, and replication processes of those cells, using those processes to reproduce and transmit itself throughout the organism. For example,

warts Warts are typically small, rough, hard growths that are similar in color to the rest of the skin. They typically do not result in other symptoms, except when on the bottom of the feet, where they may be painful. While they usually occur on the ...

and

Molluscum contagiosum Molluscum contagiosum (MC), sometimes called water warts, is a viral infection of the skin that results in small raised pink lesions with a dimple in the center. They may become itchy or sore, and occur singularly or in groups. Any area of the sk ...

can be spread by this method if wart tissue cells (skin cells altered by a

papillomavirus ''Papillomaviridae'' is a family of non- enveloped DNA viruses whose members are known as papillomaviruses. Several hundred species of papillomaviruses, traditionally referred to as "types", have been identified infecting all carefully inspected ...

) are mechanically transported to another part of the body.American Family Physician
/ref> This transmission or autoinoculation of the wart can occur by mechanical touching of one part of the organism to another, friction that removes a portion of the infected cells to an external surface (or another organism) and then reintroduces those cells upon contact with the body elsewhere, or when wart cells or tissue are transported though the blood stream of an organism.

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Medical tests Virology {{virus-stub