The heart is a target of injury for many chemical compounds, both medically prescribed and not medically prescribed. Pathophysiologic mechanisms underlying the development of chemical-induced cardiomyopathies vary depending on the inciting agent, including direct toxic effects, neurohormonal activation, altered calcium homeostasis, and oxidative stress. Numerous chemicals and drugs are implicat...

The reported frequency of circulating heart reactive antibodies in cardiomyopathies has varied and their significance is unknown. In this study such antibodies were sought in patients with primary congestive and hypertrophic cardiomyopathies and other heart diseases. Standard "single sandwich" and the more sensitive "double sandwich" indirect immunofluorescence techniques failed to disclose a s...

nition of a cardiomyopathy by the World Health Organization recognises that ventricular dysfunction can result from a failure to correct volume or pressure overload in valve disease or to control hypertension. Loss of myocardium caused by coronary artery disease also leads to severe ventricular dysfunction. All of these end stage conditions are categorised as specific cardiomyopathies. The seco...

Cardiomyopathy (CMP) is a heterogeneous disease caused by a functional abnormality of the cardiac muscle. CMP is of 2 major types, dilated and hypertrophic, and is further classified as either primary or secondary. Secondary CMP is caused by extrinsic factors, including infection, ischemia, hypertension, and metabolic disorders. Primary CMP is diagnosed when the extrinsic factors of secondary C...

This paper is designied to provide a conitemporary overview of primary myocardial disease. The cardiomyopathies are dealt with in the light of both pathophysiologic and etiologic classifications. A relatively simple diagnostic approach is based upon these classifications together with the clinical manifestations of the cardiomyopathies. The essential principles of the niatural history are summa...

Cardiomyopathy is considered as a heart muscle disease of multiple aetiologies, unlike other cardiac diseases related to a definitive pathophysiology. With more and more research and with the advent of genetic analysis pin pointing the disease causing mutations, causative factors have been defined and classifications and definitions have changed over time. Patients with these conditions present...

Cardiomyopathies can be defined as disorders of the myocardium which are associated with cardiac dysfunction and are aggravated by arrhythmias, heart failure and sudden death [Ricardson, 2006]. Genetics has played a very important role in the understanding of the different cardiomyopathies since, in 1957, Bridgen cited for the first time the word “cardio‐ myopathy” and in 1958, Teare, the Briti...

Cardiomyopathies are a heterogeneous group of diseases of the myocardium associated with mechanical and/or electrical dysfunction that usually (but not invariably) exhibit inappropriate ventricular hypertrophy or dilatation and are due to a variety of causes that frequently are genetic. Cardiomyopathies either are confined to the heart or are part of generalized systemic disorders, often leadin...

Background Diffuse myocardial fibrosis has been described in different cardiomyopathies and has recently been correlated to T1 times measured by cardiac magnetic resonance (CMR). Despite these advances it is yet unknown whether there are differences in T1 maps among these cardiomyopathies and if CMR can distinguish different levels of fibrosis in each category. Moreover, most work on T1 mapping...

Pediatric cardiomyopathies are a group of conditions that are characterized by ventricular dilatation as seen in dilated cardiomyopathy or ventricular constriction as seen with restrictive cardiomyopathy and constrictive pericarditis. Patients might develop congestive heart failure. Echocardiography and magnetic resonance imaging are the main diagnostic modalities for cardiomyopathies in childr...