online medical dictionary | definition of poll

To check the status of an input line, sensor, or memory location to see if a particular external event has been registered.

Contrast interrupt.

(01 Jan 1995)

1. To remove the poll or head of; hence, to remove the top or end of; to clip; to lop; to shear; as, to poll the head; to poll a tree. "When he [Absalom] pollled his head." (2 Sam. Xiv. 26) "His death did so grieve them that they polled themselves; they clipped off their horse and mule's hairs." (Sir T. North)

2. To cut off; to remove by clipping, shearing, etc.; to mow or crop; sometimes with off; as, to poll the hair; to poll wool; to poll grass. "Who, as he polled off his dart's head, so sure he had decreed That all the counsels of their war he would poll off like it." (Chapman)

3. <zoology> The European chub. See Pollard, 3 . Poll book, a register of persons entitled to vote at an election.

4. <veterinary> Poll evil, an inflammatory swelling or abscess on a horse's head, confined beneath the great ligament of the neck.

Origin: Akin to LG. Polle the head, the crest of a bird, the top of a tree, OD. Pol, polle, Dan. Puld the crown of a hat.

(21 Jun 1999)