diastole

plural diastoles

1. uncountableusuallymedicineThe phase or process of relaxation and dilation of the heart chambers, between contractions, during which they fill with blood; an instance of the process.

   Of the total cardiac cycle at this rate, diastole accounts for 0.50 s, or 62% of the cycle, and systole accounts for 0.31 s, or 38%.

   2008, Jack H. Wilmore, David L. Costill, W. Larry Kenney, Physiology of Sport and Exercise, page 132

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   […] I did almoſt beleeve, that the motion of the Heart vvas knovvn to God alone: For neither could I rightly diſtinguiſh, vvhich vvay the Diaſtole and Systole came to be, nor vvhen nor vvhere the dilation and conſtriction had its exiſtence.

   1653, William Harvey, “The Causes which Mov’d the Author to Write”, in [anonymous], transl., The Anatomical Exercises of Dr. William Harvey […] Concerning the Motion of the Heart and Blood. […], London: […] Francis Leach, for Richard Lownes […], →OCLC, pages 1–2

   In patients with rapid rates, diastole may be sufficiently shortened that the third and fourth heart sounds become superimposed and form a summation gallop.

   2005, Richard H. Vagelos, Rachel Marcus, J. Edwin Atwood, “35: Signs, Symptoms, and Laboratory Abnormalities in Cardiovascular Diseases”, in Robert M. Wachter, Lee Goldman, Harry Hollander, editors, Hospital Medicine, 2nd edition, page 309

   During a short cycle or premature contraction, LV ejection begins before pressure in the aorta has completely decreased, and it remains higher than with longer diastoles [4, 5].

   2011, Julian Maizel, Michel Slama, “9: Hermodynamic Evaluation in the Patient with Arrhythmias”, in Daniel de Backer, Bernard P. Cholley, Michel Slama, Antoine Vieillard-Baron, Philippe Vignon, editors, Hemodynamic Monitoring Using Echocardiography in the Critically Ill, Springer, page 90

2. rhetoricuncountableusuallyhuman sciencesThe lengthening of a vowel or syllable beyond its typical length.

   1815 March and June, On the Greek and Latin Accents, The Classical Journal, Volume XI, page 81, I have inserted diastole which is omitted in Putschius, an insertion which both the complement, and the subsequent text make necessary.

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   [A]ccording to prosody, this syllable has the diastole and the stress, whereas the second of “cujus” or of “animam” has not.

   1841, Gottfried Weber, Godfrey Weber′s General Music Teacher, page 115

   Surely Goethe′s basic dichotomy of systole and diastole in the Divan poem[…].

   2010, Jürgen Thym, Ann Clark Fehn, Of Poetry and Song: Approaches to the Nineteenth-Century Lied, page 46

3. GreekuncountableusuallygrammarThe hypodiastole, a textual or punctuation mark formerly used to disambiguate homonyms in Greek.