In old movies, actresses would put their hands up to their foreheads with the palm faced out before passing out upon the delivery of any bad news, or as a sure sign of an unsuspected pregnancy (or a bad plot). Rarely in these movies did a man faint "dead away," except for comic relief upon "not getting shot."

In real-life situations, though, fainting can represent a problem and is the cause of a huge amount of expenditure of health care dollars and patient concern. Indeed, one of the first...