dose
//ˈdəʊ̯s//
Forms
- Plural
- doses
- present (v1)
- dose
- past (v2)
- dosed
- past participle (v3)
- dosed
- present participle
- dosing
- 3rd person singular
- doses
Definitions
1.A measured portion of medicine taken at any one time.
- Why did he give you only a single 500 mg dose? The correct dosage of this antibiotic is one 500 mg tablet twice a day for 10 days.
2.The quantity of an agent (not always active), substance, or radiation administered or experienced at any one time.
3.A good measure or lengthy experience of something.
- People who don't get their daily dose of light at the right time of day can end up with worse health.
- The prospect of becoming a father is a dose of reality that threatens to bring his dream world crashing down.
4.A cold; a common, viral illness of the nasal passage, sometimes with fever.(colloquial)
- There's a dose going round.
1.To administer a dose (of medicine) to.
- "She thought herself broad awake, and I have dosed her with an opiate."
2.To prescribe a dose.
3.To surreptitiously administer a dose of an incapacitating drug (to an unwilling subject); to roofie.
Frequency
Overall
Uncommon· #3638
By learning goal
- Everyday conversation
- Rare
- General reading & writing
- Uncommon
- Academic
- Rare
- Literature
- Rare
Etymology
Borrowed from Middle French dose, from Late Latin dosis, from Ancient Greek δόσις (dósis, “a portion prescribed”, literally “a giving”), used by Galen and other Greek physicians to mean an amount of medicine, from δίδωμι (dídōmi, “to give”).
Doublet of doos.