What's the difference between decrepit and old?

Decrepit


Definition:

  • (a.) Broken down with age; wasted and enfeebled by the infirmities of old age; feeble; worn out.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) In 1972, he launched a more ambitious plan by buying Hintlesham Hall, a decrepit grade-11 listed building in Suffolk, converting it into a home and three restaurants and taking over the Hintlesham festival held there.
  • (2) Some of Rio's most impressive architecture can still be found in and around Praça XV, but it has been throttled by modernity, its colonial charm obliterated by a concrete flyover, now black and decrepit, built directly over the top of it.
  • (3) Caine’s Guardian reader may be decrepit and disillusioned but still oozes wit and discerning taste.
  • (4) I really want to say thank you for the kind way my decrepit body was washed; how, in the middle of the night when I felt overwhelmed, a nurse stopped what she was doing and held my hand; the cake covered in Smarties the catering staff brought me for my birthday; the smiles and jokes with the staff to pass the long days; and Mr Burbos (one of the handsome consultant surgeons) who has been so generous with his time and care.
  • (5) One disingenuous objection to fairer taxing of property pleads for cash-poor, asset-rich old folk rattling around in drafty, decrepit mansions.
  • (6) This is not because it’s a decrepit, leaking ship, as often depicted, but because every modern healthcare system in the world will always need more money, more research and more beds, to give patients the best chance of treatment.
  • (7) The latest WHO figures underscore Ebola’s asymmetric spread, as it travels through densely populated communities with decrepit health facilities and poor public awareness campaigns.
  • (8) The Walworth Farce, which opens at the National Theatre next week, focuses on a tyrannical Irishman who has kept his two sons locked in a decrepit flat since the trio arrived in London almost two decades before.
  • (9) Another avenue is supporting the decrepit political opposition group that exists.
  • (10) Particularly striking is the fact that Britain will end up spending less as a proportion of its national income than even the US, the international byword for a decrepit public sector.
  • (11) They have already been biting the community – one of my children's school is a decrepit building, which was built in the 70s, a mass of concrete with rotten windows and broken doors.
  • (12) This did not happen overnight, and the sorry conduct of the referendum campaign was only the latest indication of the decrepit state of our politics: dominated by shameless appeals to fear, as though hope were a currency barely worth trading in, the British public had no such thing as a better nature, and a brighter future held no appeal.
  • (13) This fact, which confirms the decrepitation theorem, could explain the explosion inside the tissues observed in surgical application of the Nd:YAG laser.
  • (14) But the worst are shikumen s, no matter how historically significant or beautiful, that have become so decrepit and grimy from decades of overcrowding, heavy communal usage and minimal infrastructural investment by residents and local authorities.
  • (15) Many were in decrepit tower-blocks, sky high and matchstick small.
  • (16) I have known the squalid, damp bedrooms of the decrepit council house; the wait for the child benefit to buy the next meal; the reality of a bag of chips being a cheaper and more comforting alternative to a nutritious meal; the constant linkage of school to failure throughout our family generations; and the inevitable lure of cigarettes and alcohol to ease the pain.
  • (17) In tears and confusion, thousands of women, children and old men expelled from Srebrenica poured off buses yesterday at the decrepit air base in the town of Tuzla, northern Bosnia, accusing Serb rebels of murder and rape and the United Nations of indifference during the fall of the enclave.
  • (18) Earlier this month, more than 600 million people lost power when the country's decrepit electricity grid collapsed .
  • (19) The debt crisis that erupted in 2009 exposed the decrepit state of the country's structures.
  • (20) She looked forward to a life beyond the decrepit confines of the capital.

Old


Definition:

  • (n.) Open country.
  • (superl.) Not young; advanced far in years or life; having lived till toward the end of the ordinary term of living; as, an old man; an old age; an old horse; an old tree.
  • (superl.) Not new or fresh; not recently made or produced; having existed for a long time; as, old wine; an old friendship.
  • (superl.) Formerly existing; ancient; not modern; preceding; original; as, an old law; an old custom; an old promise.
  • (superl.) Continued in life; advanced in the course of existence; having (a certain) length of existence; -- designating the age of a person or thing; as, an infant a few hours old; a cathedral centuries old.
  • (superl.) Long practiced; hence, skilled; experienced; cunning; as, an old offender; old in vice.
  • (superl.) Long cultivated; as, an old farm; old land, as opposed to new land, that is, to land lately cleared.
  • (superl.) Worn out; weakened or exhausted by use; past usefulness; as, old shoes; old clothes.
  • (superl.) More than enough; abundant.
  • (superl.) Aged; antiquated; hence, wanting in the mental vigor or other qualities belonging to youth; -- used disparagingly as a term of reproach.
  • (superl.) Old-fashioned; wonted; customary; as of old; as, the good old times; hence, colloquially, gay; jolly.
  • (superl.) Used colloquially as a term of cordiality and familiarity.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) A 2.5-month-old child with cyanotic heart disease who required long-term PGE1 infusions; developed widespread periosteal reactions during the course of therapy.
  • (2) Yet the Tory promise of fiscal rectitude prevailed in England Alexander had been in charge of Labour’s election strategy, but he could not strategise a victory over a 20-year-old Scottish nationalist who has not yet taken her finals.
  • (3) A 61-year-old man experienced four bouts of pancreatitis in 1 year.
  • (4) A total of 104 evaluable patients 20-90 years old treated by direct vision internal urethrotomy a.m. Sachse for urethral strictures reported retrospectively via a questionnaire their sexual potency before and after internal urethrotomy.
  • (5) A 66-year-old woman with acute idiopathic polyneuritis (Landry-Guillain-Barré [LGB] syndrome) had normal extraocular movements, but her pupils did not react to light or accommodation.
  • (6) Scatchard analyses of binding data obtained with synaptosomal preparations from 17-day-old embryos revealed two T3 binding sites.
  • (7) A remarkable deterioration of prognosis with increasing age rises the question whether treatment with cytotoxic drugs should be tried in patients more than 60 years old.
  • (8) A specimen of a very early ovum, 4 to 6 days old, shown in the luminal form of imbedding before any hemorrhage has taken place, confirms that the luminal form of imbedding does occur.
  • (9) Data collection at the old hospital for comparison, however, was not always reliable.
  • (10) A leg ulcer in a 52-year-old renal transplant patient yielded foamy histiocytes containing acid-fast bacilli subsequently identified as a Runyon group III Mycobacterium.
  • (11) The 36-year-old teacher at an inner-city London primary school earns £40,000 a year and contributes £216 a month to her pension.
  • (12) Eight-week-old virgin untreated female mice were induced to ovulate using equine chorionic gonadotropin (eCG) and human chorionic gonadotropin (hCG), and were then caged with males overnight.
  • (13) The authors report an ocular luxation of a four-year-old girl after a bicycle accident.
  • (14) Peak incidence is found among 40 to 49-year-old and 60 to 64-year-old women.
  • (15) The capillary-adipocyte distances were shorter and the vascularization density was higher in old rats.
  • (16) Brilliant, old-fashioned speech, from the days before teleprompters became all-dominant.
  • (17) Though the 54-year-old designer made brief returns to the limelight after his fall from grace, designing a one-off collection for Oscar de la Renta last year , his appointment at Margiela marks a more permanent comeback.
  • (18) He also deals with the incidence, conservative and surgical treatment of osteo-arthrosis in old age and with the possibilities of its prevention.
  • (19) Sterile, pruritic papules and papulopustules that formed annular rings developed on the back of a 58-year-old woman.
  • (20) The first patient, an 82-year-old woman, developed a WPW syndrome suggesting posterior right ventricular preexcitation, a pattern which persisted for four months until her death.