["Functional cardiac symptoms"].

1. Symptoms which may afflict us include a characteristic chest pain, a typical palpitation, a special kind of breathlessness and a peculiar loss of consciousness. These symptoms differ from the symptoms produced by heart diseases. They are psychic in origin and the manifestation of a special state of mind. The misleading term "functional symptoms" should be abandoned. 2. The psychogenic symptoms are very frequent. 170 out of a non-selected group of 310 patients in a cardiological private practice complained of one or the other of these symptoms. In 107 of these patients the complaints were exclusively psychic in origin. More than half of all chest pains, 30% of all palpitations, a fourth of the breathlessness and 65% of all loss of consciousness belonged to this category. 3. Awareness that these symptoms are harmless, and that complete well-being is a rather rare and mostly shortlived gift, would appear to be helpful and is often followed by a considerable improvement in health. In other patients, however, more extensive psychotherapy appears to be needed.