Cardio-Vascular System is a Misnomer

The expression the “cardio-vascular system” is a household name in all the countries that are serviced by western medicine.  It is used universally to describe our blood flow system.  Yet it is a nonsensical mismatch of terms which totally ignores the existence of our muscles.

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Born in the year 1578, an English physician named William Harvey

discovered the “mechanism of blood circulation”.

Blood is pumped into the body by the heart, along the tubes of the arteries but

the blood is pumped back to heart by the muscles, along the tubes of the veins.

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The pump of the heart, the “cardio” is one half of the blood circulatory system.

The pump of the muscles, the “muscular system” or “venous pump” is the other half.

The blood travels out along the tubes of the arteries, the “arterial system”.

The blood travels back through the tubes of the veins, the “vascular system”.

 

Therefore the sensible and more accurately descriptive name for our blood flow system should be one of the following;

(i)           The heart-muscular system (pump with pump) or

(ii)          The cardio- muscular system (pump with pump) or

(iii)         The cardio-venous system (pump with pump) or

(iv)         The arterial-vascular system (tubes with tubes).

But not, the “cardio-vascular system” (outward pump with returning tubes).

The ideas expressed in this blog are the original concept of Linda Dodds.

All rights reserved.  Copyright © Linda Dodds 2011.