Skip to main content
cardiotoxic

cardiotoxic

1 7.2
Causes harm to the heart or makes it work badly
  • adjective
  • /ˌkɑrdiəˈtɑksɪk/
  • Specialized
: cardiotóxico
  • Patients should be cautious with medications that are cardiotoxic, as they can lead to serious heart issues.

Examples

  • The highest intensity of monitoring should be reserved for drugs with cardiotoxic effects demonstrated in nonclinical investigation or other analyses (Table III).

    Academic text (2016)
  • A more extensive monitoring approach for drugs that have (or belong to a class that has) known cardiotoxic effects, either in channel blocking studies or in preclinical studies, or are known to be metabolic blockers of some variety.

    Academic text (2016)
  • Certain chemotherapy drugs are known to be cardiotoxic, affecting the heart muscle during treatment.

  • The research indicated that some herbal supplements can have cardiotoxic effects on individuals with pre-existing heart conditions.

Surface Forms

cardiotoxic positive

Morphology

cardiotoxic = toxic (semi-transparent) = cardio + toxic

The meaning is a regular technical combination of 'cardio-' (heart) and 'toxic', but the combining form 'cardio-' is not highly transparent for many learners.

Etymology

The word cardiotoxic comes from an old Greek part cardio- meaning 'heart' and the word toxic meaning 'poison', like in cardio exercise and the word toxin. So, cardiotoxic literally means 'poison to the heart', which is why it describes something harmful to the heart muscle or its function.