DO
Abbreviation with 4 meanings
| Stands for | Doctor of Osteopathic Medicine |
|---|---|
| Meanings | 4 |
| Categories | Education & Academia, Geography & Places, Science & Engineering, Writing & Everyday |
| Also written | do. |
DO has four meanings. The most common are Doctor of Osteopathic Medicine (degree) and Dominican Republic (country code); it can also stand for Dissolved oxygen and Ditto.
Meanings of DO at a glance
| # | DO stands for | Context |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Doctor of Osteopathic Medicine | Education & Academia › Degree |
| 2 | Dominican Republic | Geography & Places › Country Code |
| 3 | Dissolved oxygen | Science & Engineering › Environmental |
| 4 | Ditto | Writing & Everyday › Genealogy |
1. Doctor of Osteopathic Medicine
Education & Academia · Degree Abbreviations · also used in medicine
Degree held by osteopathic physicians, who are fully licensed to practice medicine and surgery in all 50 states. DO students complete four years of training similar to MD programs plus more than 200 hours in osteopathic manipulative treatment, and they take the COMLEX-USA licensing exams.
Example: Dr. Patel, DO, practices family medicine and offers osteopathic manipulative treatment for back pain.
Written D.O. Andrew Taylor Still founded the first osteopathic medical school in Kirksville, Missouri, in 1892. Since 2020, MD and DO graduates enter residencies under a single accreditation system run by the ACGME. Roughly a quarter of US medical students attend osteopathic schools. Osteopaths trained outside the US practice manual therapy and are not physicians.
2. Dominican Republic
Geography & Places · Country Code Abbreviations
The Dominican Republic occupies the eastern part of Hispaniola, with Santo Domingo as its capital and DOM as its alpha-3 code. Tourism and remittances are major parts of its economy.
Example: Cigars rolled in the DO are labeled with the Santiago region of origin.
Americans often call the country the DR. Dominica, a separate island nation, uses DM. The .do domain is sometimes used for to-do list apps.
3. Dissolved oxygen
Science & Engineering · Environmental Abbreviations
Amount of oxygen gas dissolved in water, essential for fish and other aquatic life and a key indicator of water quality. Most fish need more than about 5 milligrams per liter, and waters below about 2 mg/L are considered hypoxic, creating "dead zones."
Example: DO at the river bottom fell to 1.8 mg/L during the August heat wave, causing a fish kill.
Cold water holds more oxygen than warm water: about 14.6 mg/L at 0 °C versus about 9 mg/L at 20 °C. Nutrient runoff fuels algal blooms whose decay consumes oxygen, producing the large summer dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico. DO is measured with optical or electrochemical probes.
4. Ditto (do.)
Writing & Everyday · Genealogy Abbreviations
Means "the same as above" in census returns, ledgers, registers and lists, avoiding repetition. Genealogists meet it constantly on old census pages, where it repeats surnames and birthplaces.
Example: In the 1850 census, the birthplace column reads "Ohio" for the father and "do." for each child.
The word ditto comes from Tuscan Italian ditto, a form of detto, "said." Ditto marks serve the same purpose in lists. Transcribers must expand "do." correctly, since misreading it can introduce errors into indexes. In music, do is the first note of the solfège scale.
Related abbreviations
More degree abbreviations
- DMA – Doctor of Musical Arts
- DMD – Doctor of Dental Medicine
- DMin – Doctor of Ministry
- DNP – Doctor of Nursing Practice
- DPhil – Doctor of Philosophy
- DPM – Doctor of Podiatric Medicine
- DPT – Doctor of Physical Therapy
- DrPH – Doctor of Public Health
See all 139 degree abbreviations →