Dead on arrival or DOA is a notation that a patient was brought to a hospital and immediately pronounced dead by a physician. The term arises because first responders such as emergency medical technicians (a.k.a. paramedics or ambulance drivers) do not have the authority to pronounce a patient dead (in the U.S. at least), and they are obliged, in the absence of a do not resuscitate order, to attempt resuscitation if there is any possibility of life and to continue resuscitation until the patient has been examined by a physician, which usually occurs only after the patient has been brought to a hospital. Death is the cessation of physical life in a living organism or the state of the organism after that event. ... First responder is a term used by national authorities for local law enforcement, local Emergency Medical Technicians (EMTs), local firemen and fire rescue. ... An emergency medical technician (EMT) is an emergency responder trained to provide emergency medical services (EMS) to the critically ill and injured. ... Typical view of the defibrillator operator. ... ... A DNR, or Do Not Resuscitate order, is a written order from a doctor that resuscitation should not be attempted if a person suffers cardiac or respiratory arrest. ...

Colloquially, anything which is received in a non-operational (broken) state can be called DOA or dead on arrival. If a new product, such as a computer, arrives "DOA" then it is likely that the recipient will call the supplier to get a Return Merchandise Authorization (RMA), a transaction that acknowledges that (apparently defective) goods will be returned to the supplier for refund, replacement or credit. Sometimes it is difficult to actually detect a defective or DOA product. With computers, for instance, it might require a boot image to be installed and run through a test suite to detect any failed parts. A drawing of the everyday computer. ... A Return Merchandise Authorization (RMA) is a transaction whereby the recipient of a product arranges to return defective goods to the supplier to have the product repaired or replaced or in order to receive a refund or credit for another product from the same retailer or corporation. ... RMA is the abbreviation for: Return Merchandise Authorization Resource Management Act, an importanct Act of Parliament in New Zealand Revolution in Military Affairs This is a disambiguation page — a navigational aid which lists other pages that might otherwise share the same title. ... A boot image is the sequence of bits on the boot device that interface with computer hardware - usually includes operating system, utilities and diagnostics, boot and data recovery information. ...

When, as with computers, product complexity is high and diagnostics are involved, the medical metaphor is perhaps appropriate, as complex diagnostics might be required to determine if the product "is really dead". A boot image control strategy is a common way to reduce total cost of operations in organizations with large numbers of similar computers being used by users with common needs, e. ...

See also

• DOA (disambiguation page)