延缓

• Pinyin: yán huǎn
• Hanzi breakdown: 延 = 廴 + 止 (extended movement — stretch/prolong); 缓 = 纟(silk/thread radical — something yielding and flexible) + 爰 (to aid/ease — suggesting gentleness and deliberate slowness)

Meaning

To delay; to retard; to slow the progress or onset of something. To buy more time by deliberately slowing a process.

Implies slowing or deferring something rather than stopping it entirely. Common in medical contexts (延缓病情 = slow disease progression), health discourse (延缓老化 = slow aging), and policy management (延缓实施 = defer implementation). Distinguishes from 延误 (unintentional or harmful delay) and 延迟 (neutral postponement) by its purposeful, managing quality.

Examples

1. 医学研究人员致力于开发一种新型药物，希望能有效延缓阿尔茨海默症患者认知功能的退化进程。 Medical researchers are working to develop a new drug in hopes that it can effectively slow the decline of cognitive function in Alzheimer’s patients.
2. 政府采取了一系列积极的财政和货币政策措施，成功延缓了经济下行的速度，为结构性改革争取了宝贵时间。 The government adopted a series of proactive fiscal and monetary measures, successfully slowing the pace of the economic downturn and buying valuable time for structural reforms.
3. 定期的有氧运动和均衡的饮食结构有助于延缓细胞的氧化老化过程，从而在一定程度上减缓衰老速度。 Regular aerobic exercise and a balanced diet can help slow oxidative cellular aging, thereby reducing the speed of aging to some extent.

Usage Guide

Context: medicine, science, policy, health

Tone: neutral

Do Say

• 科学家发现一种从海洋生物中提取的活性物质，在动物实验阶段已显示出显著的延缓肿瘤生长的效果。(Scientists have discovered an active compound extracted from marine organisms that, in the animal-testing phase, has shown a significant ability to slow tumour growth.)
• 该项政策原定于本季度末正式实施，但因配套细则尚未完善，主管部门决定将执行时间延缓至下一财年。(The policy was originally scheduled to take effect at the end of this quarter, but as the accompanying detailed regulations were not yet finalised, the competent authority decided to defer implementation to the next fiscal year.)

Don't Say

• 延缓了火车 — 延缓 means to slow or defer a process; for a train running late use 晚点 or 延误; 延缓列车 is unnatural and does not correspond to the word's actual usage pattern

Origin & History

延 (to extend/prolong) + 缓 (slow/gentle) — to extend something by slowing it down

Cultural Context

Era: Modern

Generation: All ages

Social background: Universal