II. Classifying CVS Diseases

When looking at how to classify CVS diseases, it’s best to keep it simple. There are many possible ways of classifying disease, and here are two suggestions:

1. According to Aetiology

2. According to Anatomy

 

Aetiology (VITAMIN C, D)

  • Vascular – eg. Coronary atherosclerosis and ischaemic heart disease
  • Inflammatory/infectious – eg. infective endocarditis; rheumatic heart disease; viral myocarditis
  • Traumatic/Mechanical or Toxic – eg. cardiac tamponade ; coarctation of the aorta
  • Autoimmune
  • Metabolic -  infiltrative or storage diseases
  • Iatrogenic or Idiopathic – eg. drug induced cardiotoxicity
  • Neoplastic – eg. atrial myxoma
  • Congenital – eg. congenital cardiac structural abnormalities – ventricular and atrial septal defects; tetralogy of Fallot etc.
  • Degenerative – eg. calcific aortic stenosis

Note: Heart failure is a multifactorial disease that can be caused by a single main cause or a combination of cardiovascular conditions. It is often the common end point of many heart diseases.

  • Within each anatomical subsite, some aetiologies feature more readily / commonly. In addition to simply listing conditions in each subsite, think about the aetioloic categories these conditions fall into. 
  • Examples of entities are included here under the main anatomical subsites. This is not a comprehensive table of entities, but an example of this means of classification. I have also included a column for Aetiology as well. Note that conduction abnormalities have not been included in this table.
  • Table 1: Cardiovascular diseases according to anatomical site 

table-1-anatomical-classification