dose

[ dohs ]

/ doʊs /

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See synonyms for: dose / dosed / dosing on Thesaurus.com

noun

a quantity of medicine prescribed to be taken at one time.

a substance, situation, or quantity of anything analogous to medicine, especially of something disagreeable: Failing the exam was a hard dose to swallow.

an amount of sugar added in the production of champagne.

Physics.

Also called ab·sorbed dose. the quantity of ionizing radiation absorbed by a unit mass of matter, especially living tissue, measured in grays: although increasingly disfavored, in the U.S. an absorbed dose may still be measured in rads.
exposure dose.

Slang. a case of gonorrhea or syphilis.

verb (used with object), dosed, dos·ing.

to administer in or apportion for doses.

to give a dose of medicine to.

to add sugar to (champagne) during production.

verb (used without object), dosed, dos·ing.

to take a dose of medicine.

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Origin of dose

First recorded in 1590–1600; French , from Late Latin dosis, from Greek dósis “a giving, gift,” derivative of didónai “to give”

OTHER WORDS FROM dose

doser, nounsu·per·dose, nounun·der·dose, nounun·der·dose, verb (used with object), un·der·dosed, un·der·dos·ing.

well-dosed, adjective

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023

How to use dose in a sentence

Equality would mean each country gets the same proportion of vaccine doses relative to its population size, and at the same rate.
Who should get the Covid-19 vaccine first? Ethicists are fiercely debating how to vaccinate billions of people.|Sigal Samuel|November 20, 2020|Vox
Also still unknown is what share of the volunteers who got both vaccine doses were included in the new analysis.
New Pfizer vaccine appears 90 percent effective against COVID-19|Erin Garcia de Jesus|November 10, 2020|Science News For Students
Limited initial doses are likely to go first to health-care workers, members of the advisory committee on immunization have said.
Pfizer coronavirus vaccine could be cleared by mid-December following release of data showing it is more than 90 percent effective|Laurie McGinley, Lena H. Sun, Carolyn Y. Johnson|November 10, 2020|Washington Post
The publicly released data did not include how many cases were recorded in each group or what portion of the nearly 39,000 people who got both vaccine doses were included in the analysis.
Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine is 90% effective, preliminary trial data show|Erin Garcia de Jesus|November 9, 2020|Science News

In 2016, a pair of studies from New York University and Johns Hopkins found that a single dose could significantly improve symptoms of anxiety and depression in terminally ill cancer patients.
Oregon just voted to legalize magic mushrooms. Here’s what that actually means.|Rachel Feltman|November 5, 2020|Popular-Science

British Dictionary definitions for dose

dose

/ (dəʊs) /

noun

med a specific quantity of a therapeutic drug or agent taken at any one time or at specified intervals

informal something unpleasant to experiencea dose of influenza

Also called: dosage the total energy of ionizing radiation absorbed by unit mass of material, esp of living tissue; usually measured in grays (SI unit) or rads

Also called: dosage a small amount of syrup added to wine, esp sparkling wine, when the sediment is removed and the bottle is corked

slang a venereal infection, esp gonorrhoea

like a dose of salts very quickly indeed

verb (tr)

to administer a dose or doses to (someone)

med to give (a therapeutic drug or agent) in appropriate quantities

(often foll by up) to give (someone, esp oneself) drugs, medicine, etc, esp in large quantities

to add syrup to (wine) during bottling

Derived forms of dose

doser, noun

Word Origin for dose

C15: from French, from Late Latin dosis, from Greek: a giving, from didonai to give

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

dose

Origin of dose

OTHER WORDS FROM dose

Words related to dose

How to use dose in a sentence

British Dictionary definitions for dose

Derived forms of dose

Word Origin for dose