C ardiomyopathy is a disease of unknown etiology in which presenting signs and symptoms result predominantly from dysfunction of the myocardium. A number of factors have been implicated in the causation of cardiomyopathy including alcohol,’ nutritional deficiency,2 the postpartal state,3 and virus infections.4*5 Among these considerations is an underlying immunologic disturbance, particularly a...

Cardiovascular diseases are common in cats. 3 Myocardial disorders are the major cause of heart failure and thromboembolism, with idiopathic hypertrophic cardiomyopathy the most important of the primary myocardial diseases. Extensive myocardial fibrosis leading to a restrictive cardiomyopathy or right ventricular cardiomyopathy is now recognized on a regular basis in mature cats. Conversely, di...

Tissue from the explanted hearts of 21 patients with idiopathic dilated cardiomyopathy or 19 patients with other specific heart muscle diseases were investigated for presence of enterovirusspecific RNA with an enterovirus group-specific cDNA probe. This was complementary to coxsackievirus B2 RNA sequences between nucleotide numbers 6,550 and 7,400, which are highly conserved between enterovirus...

Primary heart failure in cardiomyopathy occurs in (1) hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, a genetic disease of the sarcomere; and (2) in dilated cardiomyopathy. The latter is often regarded as idiopathic in origin, but requires exclusion of all possible etiologies which are becoming easier to identify with modern investigative techniques. Tachycardia-induced cardiomyopathy is now increasingly recogniz...

BACKGROUND The differential diagnosis between idiopathic and cardiomyopathy-related right ventricular outflow tract (RVOT) ventricular arrhythmias (VAs) is crucial. Signal-averaged ECG (SAECG) abnormalities are frequent in cardiomyopathy-related RVOT-VAs, although their pathophysiologic basis and diagnostic value in this setting are undefined. We tested the association between SAECG and the myo...

background: cardiac resynchronization therapy (crt) is an effective treatment for patients with moderate to severe heart failure. however, 20-30% of patients remain non-responders to crt. we sought to identify which patients benefit the most from crt in regard to the etiology of heart failure. methods: eighty-three consecutive patients (62 men) who had a biventricular pacemaker inserted at tehr...

reduced longevity.1 Heart failure can be due to systolic or diastolic left ventricular dysfunction. Most patients with heart failure have primarily systolic dysfunction. In two-thirds of patients with systolic dysfunction, the cause is coronary artery disease.2 However, patients may also have nonischaemic causes of cardiomyopathy such as hypertension, valvular heart disease, myocarditis, system...

o a i “ l f o t i o Functional mitral regurgitation typically occurs in patients with ischemic cardiomyopathy or idiopathic dilated cardiomyopathy and is independently associated with excessive morbidity and mortality (1–8). In functional mitral regurgitation, it has been demonstrated that abnormal mitral valve kinematics result from a restriction of leaflet closure as a result of enhanced apic...

Peripartum cardiomyopathy (PPCM) is a form of idiopathic dilated cardiomyopathy affecting women in late pregnancy or early puerperium. Although initially described in the late 1800s, it has only recently been recognized as a distinct cardiac condition. The reported incidence and prognosis varies according to geography. The clinical course varies between complete recovery to rapid progression to...

Background Dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM) occurring due to an unknown etiology or genetic predisposition is termed as idiopathic dilated cardiomyopathy (iDCM), although iDCM may also result from viral exposure. However, the incidence of myocardial inflammation and its relation to left ventricular (LV) function in iDCM remains unknown. Cardiovascular magnetic resonance (CMR) imaging allows for the...