Cardiomyopathy is a disease that causes the heart muscle to become weak and ineffective, reducing the heart's ability to pump blood through the body and possibly leading to heart failure. The rate at which cardiomyopathy was recorded by general practitioner (GP) participants in the BEACH program has not changed significantly since 2000. On average, it was managed at 0.9 per 1000 encounters between April 2000 and March 2013, a total of 1175 times over that period. In 9 out of 10 cases, GPs used the general term cardiomyopathy, whereas in the other 10% this was specified as hypertrophic, congestive, secondary or restrictive.