Dorland's is the brand name of a family of medical reference works (including dictionaries, spellers and word books, and spell-check software) in various media spanning printed books, CD-ROMs, and online content. The flagship products are Dorland's Illustrated Medical Dictionary (currently in its 33rd edition) and Dorland's Pocket Medical Dictionary (currently in its 30th edition). The principal dictionary was first published in 1890 as the American Illustrated Medical Dictionary, including 770 pages. The pocket edition, called the American Pocket Medical Dictionary, was first published in 1898, consisting of just over 500 pages.
With the death of the editor William Alexander Newman Dorland, AM, MD in 1956, the dictionaries were retitled to incorporate his name, which was how they had generally come to be known. The illustrated dictionary had grown to 2144 pages for the 33rd edition.
The dictionaries were historically published by Saunders.
In addition to the Saunders titles in English, there have also been numerous translated co-editions around the world. Listed below are the latest translated co-editions of the flagship product Dorland's Illustrated Medical Dictionary, together with the languages for the translations and the names of the publishers:
Dorland's was published for over a century by the W.B. Saunders Company, which was an independent medical publisher during most of that time. In the 1980s and 1990s, W.B. Saunders was acquired first by CBS and then by Harcourt. In 2001, the company was absorbed into Elsevier, where the name Saunders (without the W.B.) was used as an imprint name. The 2020 33rd edition imprint is Elsevier.
Contexo Media's Dorland Healthcare Information, publisher of Dorland's Medical Directory, appears to be unrelated to Elsevier, Saunders, and the Dorland's family of medical reference works.
