▪ I. overdose, n.
(ˈəʊvədəʊs)
[over- 29 a.]
An excessive dose, too large a dose.
| 1700 Locke Essay Hum. Und. (ed. 4) ii. xxxiii. 223 Had this happen'd to him, by an overdose of Honey, when a Child, all the same Effects would have followed. 1762 Frewen in Phil. Trans. LII. 454 One..who had taken an over-dose of opium, and died of it. 1858 W. Arnot Laws fr. Heaven II. xxiv. 197 We shall not be spoilt by over-doses of loving kindness. 1916 [see cobber n.2]. 1931 H. Crane Let. 22 June (1965) 375, I have to leave most of this to your judgment of the potency and malfeasance of an overdose of tequila. 1952 M. Laski Village ix. 147 An overdose of Miss Beltram produced the inevitable effect..you couldn't help taking the other point of view. a 1953 E. O'Neill Long Day's Journey (1956) iii. 105, I hope, sometime, without meaning it, I will take an overdose. 1965 New Statesman 7 May 729/3 Rosetti's..wife died after only two years of marriage, of an overdose of drugs. 1971 Black Scholar June 53/2 There are brothers..who have been singled out for overdoses of the atrocities that we are being subjected to. 1973 Times 16 July 14/7 Others were either seeking immediate emotional release or were trying to produce a dramatic effect on friends or relatives—and in both such cases an overdose achieved the desired result. |
▪ II. ˌoverˈdose, v.
[over- 27.]
1. trans. To administer (medicine, etc.) in too large a dose.
| 1727 Somerville Martial Epigr. 47 in Occ. Poems 128 A merry Bottle to engender Wit, Not over-dosed, but Quantum sufficit. 1777 Wright in Phil. Trans. LXVII. 511 Fatal accidents have happened..from over-dosing the medicine. |
2. To dose (a person, etc.) to excess; to give too large a dose to; also transf. of the admixture of an ingredient, the issuing of stock, etc.
| 1758 Reid tr. Macquer's Chem. I. 228 As apt to take fire as common Sulphur, if it were not over-dosed with the Acid. 1822–34 Good's Study Med. (ed. 4) I. 151 If we over-dose the patient at first, we add to the disease. 1893 Daily News 13 Feb. 2/6 Neither Paris nor London has been overdosed with new issues of foreign stocks for years past. |
3. intr. To take an overdose of drugs. Hence ˈoverdosing vbl. n.
| 1973 R. Ludlum Matlock Paper xxx. 261 The doctor told me that he'd prescribe heavier ‘medication’ but warned me not to overdose. 1974 G. McDonald Fletch (1976) xvii. 100 She was dead... He guessed she had overdosed. 1977 Times 19 Jan. 14/2 Heroin smoking..throws overdosing figures into doubt. 1977 Wood & Geasland Twins 21 You don't take a full bottle of an anticonvulsant if you mean to overdose on Seconal. |