Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. a doctor; thus she-medico, a female doctor.

1833		M. Scott Tom Cringle’s Log (1862) 206: ‘I am regularly done up myself,’ quoth the medico.
1844		A.W. Kinglake Eothen 308: The Medico held my chin in the usual way, and examined my throat.
1853		G.J. Whyte-Melville Digby Grand (1890) 57: Dr Squirt, the quaintest, jolliest ‘medico’ that ever handled lancet.
1863		G.A. Sala Breakfast in Bed 227: ‘Try it,’ said my medico, ‘and come to me in three week’s time.’.
1875		‘Aliph Cheem’ Lays of Ind (1905) 178: The medico came in hot haste.
1880		N.Z. Observer (Auckland) 18 Sept. 3: That worthy ‘medico,’ Dr. Beaney, of Melbourne, is resorting to advertising again I see.
1887		Bulletin (Sydney) 15 Oct. 13/1: The savage was so flabbergasted that the medico would not get an inkling of the trouble, but as this happened at a time in his career when a case was a circumstance, the doctor mounted his chariot, and followed in the wake of the spud-miner’s go car.
1888		Soldiers’ Stories and Sailors’ Yarns 145: Even the medico admitted the percentage of tannin to be excessive.
1894		Truth (Sydney) 24 June 1/4: There’s Squills, to whom no wise men go / [...] / Who’s far less of a medico / Than bumming politician.
1898		Binstead & Wells A Pink ’Un and a Pelican 73: Hugh [...] watched the great medico step across the room to the washstand.
1901		E.W. Hornung Black Mask (1992) 157: Our medico had married the week before, nor was any fellow-practitioner taking his work.
1901		W.A. Sun. Times (Perth) 21 Apr. 1/1: The much-used ’phones of medicos and newspapers.
1906		‘O. Henry’ ‘The Skylight Room’ in Four Million (1915) 56: The capable young medico, in his white linen coat, ready, active, confident.
1913		Day Book (Chicago) 6 Aug. 17/2: The youthful medico came bustling downstairs.
1922		Joyce Ulysses 571: Most of all he commented adversely on the desertion of Stephen by all his pubhunting confrères, a most glaring piece of ratting on the part of his brother medicos under all the circs.
1938		W. Winchell ‘On Broadway’ 1 Nov. [synd. col.] The George Gershwin’s mater will wed a Central Park West medico soon.
1940		E. O’Neill Iceman Cometh Act I: He strikes me as the only bloody sensible medico I ever heard of.
1959		A. Zugsmith Beat Generation 113: The medicos now, they don’t want you to gain over a certain amount of weight.
1962		H.S. Thompson letter 28 Aug. in Proud Highway (1997) 351: Most of the medicos on the continent.
1970		H.E. Bates A Little of What You Fancy (1985) 511: Will report at the same hour tomorrow if the medico permits. Press on.
1995		A. Higgins Donkey’s Years 292: A resident medico beckoned me into a small well-heated room [...] and told me in effect that my mother was dying.
1996		J. Byrell Lairs, Urgers & Coat-Tuggers 40: But the pookeroonies were completely unprepared for what the exceptional medico had in store for them and the settlement.
2005		J. Stahl I, Fatty 227: Both sides trotted out a string of medicos.

2. a medical student.

1947

K. Amis letter 19 Dec. in Leader (2000) 147: That crazy Welsh medico (Brown) came up to us.