A medical condition where difficulty breathing is caused by cardiac disease or heart dysfunction rather than lung disease.
From Greek 'kardia' meaning 'heart' combined with 'asthma' from 'aazein' meaning 'to pant' or 'breathe hard.' This term emerged in 19th-century medicine to distinguish heart-related shortness of breath from pulmonary asthma.
Cardiasthma is an important historical distinction—modern doctors call this 'cardiac dyspnea' or 'pulmonary edema,' but the term reminds us that breathing problems don't always come from the lungs; your struggling heart can drown them too.
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