From Longman Dictionary of Contemporary Englishdegenerativede‧gen‧e‧ra‧tive /dɪˈdʒenərətɪv/ adjective MIa degenerative illness gradually gets worse and cannot be stopped → progressive
Examples from the Corpus
degenerative• Parkinson's disease is a degenerative brain disorder that causes tremors and muscle rigidity among other symptoms.• In cases with massive deposits, there were degenerative changes in muscle fibres, with muscle tissue being replaced by amyloid.• All these are degenerative diseases of the central nervous system.• Her problem was arthritis and degenerative diseases of the heart.• These degenerative diseases - spongiform encephalopathies - have been linked to the production of abnormal proteins in the brain.• But it did not work at all well for the degenerative diseases such as cancer, lupus, or various heart conditions.• The new discipline thus has the capacity to lead the way to breakthroughs in the treatment of any number of degenerative diseases.• Suddenly everything seems to cause cancer or degenerative heart disease or premature loss of memory. 