Syncope derives from the Greek synkoptein, meaning to strike, cut off, or weary. Hippocrates and biblical texts describe victims of fainting. In the USA syncope accounts for 3% of emergency room visits and 1–6% of all hospital admissions,¹ Pierre Adolph Piorry² (1794–1879) in 1826 reported,

“When a patient faints, symptoms improve when he is laid flat.”³

Piorry was a pioneer of percussion and pleximetry, best remembered for his work in chest diseases and for coining the term “uraemia”.

Thomas Addison, when describing postural syncope in adrenal failure, also noted:

“Attacks of giddiness and dimness of sight…would occur always …