Doctor

Pronunciation

• UK IPA: /ˈdÉ’k.tÉ™/
• US IPA: /ˈdÉ‘k.tÉš/

Alternative forms

• doctour obsolete

Origin

From Middle English doctor, doctour ("an expert, authority on a subject"), from Anglo-Norman doctour, from Latin doctor ("teacher"), from doceō ("I teach"). Displaced native Middle English lerare ("doctor, teacher") (from Middle English leren ("to teach, instruct") from Old English lǣran, lēran ("to teach, instruct, guide"), compare Old English lārēow ("teacher, master")).

Full definition of doctor

Noun

1. A physician; a member of the medical profession; one who is trained and licensed to heal the sick. The final examination and qualification may award a doctor degree in which case the post-nominal letters are Doctor of Osteopathic Medicine, DPM, , DMD, DDS, DPT, DC, in the US or MBBS in the UK.If you still feel unwell tomorrow, see your doctor.
• ShakespeareBy medicine life may be prolonged, yet death
  Will seize the doctor too.
2. A person who has attained a doctorate, such as a Ph.D. or Th.D. or one of many other terminal degrees conferred by a college or university.
3. A veterinarian; a medical practitioner who treats animals.
4. A nickname for a person who has special knowledge or talents to manipulate or arrange transactions.
5. (obsolete) A teacher; one skilled in a profession or a branch of knowledge; a learned man.
• Francis Baconone of the doctors of Italy, Nicholas Macciavel
6. (dated) Any mechanical contrivance intended to remedy a difficulty or serve some purpose in an exigency.the doctor of a calico-printing machine, which is a knife to remove superfluous colouring matterthe doctor, or auxiliary engine, also called "donkey engine"
• 2010, Ramesh Bangia, Dictionary of Information Technology (page 172)The use of a disk doctor may be the only way of recovering valuable data following a disk crash.
7. A fish, the friar skate.

Usage notes

Doctor is capitalized when used as a title:

Doctor Smith

Synonyms

• (physician) doc informal, family doctor, general practitioner, GP UK, medic, physician, sawbones slang, surgeon (who undertakes surgery)
• (veterinarian) vet, veterinarian, veterinary, veterinary surgeon

Derived terms

Related terms

Verb

1. (transitive) To act as a medical doctor to.Her children doctored her back to health.
2. (transitive) To make (someone) into an (academic) doctor; to confer a doctorate upon.
3. (transitive) To physically alter (medically or surgically) a living being in order to change growth or behavior.They doctored their apple trees by vigorous pruning, and now the dwarfed trees are easier to pick.We may legally doctor a pet to reduce its libido.
4. (transitive) To genetically alter an extant species.''Mendel's discoveries showed how the evolution of a species may be doctored.
5. (transitive) To alter or make obscure, as with the intention to deceive, especially a document.To doctor the signature of an instrument with intent to defraud is an example of forgery.