Cardiomyopathy is a heart condition involving abnormalities of the muscle fibers, which contract with each heartbeat. According to the Pediatric Cardiomyopathy Registry, one in every 100,000 children in the U.S. under the age of 18 is diagnosed with cardiomyopathy. Dilated cardiomyopathy is the most common type of cardiomyopathy in infancy, childhood, and adolescence. Many children newly diagnosed with dilated cardiomyopathy and heart failure do not have a good long-term prognosis and may need a heart transplant or other medical interventions in order to survive.
Children’s Hospital of Michigan Pediatric Cardiologist Steven E. Lipshultz, M.D., senior author and principal investigator of the study, explains that some children with dilated cardiomyopathy have other family members known to have dilated cardiomyopathy. This is called familial dilated cardiomyopathy and is mostly due to a gene mutation or set of gene mutations found in family members.
Dr. Lipshultz says that children with familial dilated cardiomyopathy are generally diagnosed at a younger age than children where their dilated cardiomyopathy is not thought to be familial since they are more likely to be screened for heart problems at an earlier age due to known other family members affected with this condition. The children with familial dilated cardiomyopathy are more likely to receive a heart transplant or intervention such as placement of a left ventricular assist device sooner due to earlier screening and therefore being identified as high risk.
“What this new study shows is that just because the children with familial dilated cardiomyopathy are more likely to receive a heart transplant, these heart transplants may not always be necessary since we found that these children may not die sooner or in greater numbers than children with dilated cardiomyopathy whose cause is not known to be familial. This is a critical finding since some of those children with familial dilated cardiomyopathy who received a transplant might have survived without having received a heart transplant,” he says.
Dr. Lipshultz adds that the second breakthrough from this paper suggests many of the children with idiopathic dilated cardiomyopathy should have a more comprehensive assessment of whether they have a genetic cause of their dilated cardiomyopathy. The term “idiopathic” indicates that a cause for the child’s cardiomyopathy has not been identified. This is because some who are classified as idiopathic may be familial but have not been completely evaluated. This may make it a challenge for families who have a child with familial dilated cardiomyopathy since other family members who may be affected simply would not know.
“This paper suggests that genetic and echocardiographic screening of the families of all children with dilated cardiomyopathy is supported since their courses are so similar and the early identification of genetic associations or inheritance patterns may help for management, family counseling and treatment plans,” Dr. Lipshultz says.
Luanne Thomas-Ewald, CEO of the Children’s Hospital of Michigan, stated: “At the Children’s Hospital of Michigan, life is transformed by scientific advancements to achieve a better future for our patients. With this research, we are not only changing how we most appropriately treat children with heart diseases at the Children’s Hospital of Michigan, but we are also changing the way the world thinks about this important issue.”
The National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute of the NIH has funded this study as the Pediatric Cardiomyopathy Registry, which was founded by Dr. Lipshultz and his colleagues in 1990, has been funded by the NIH since 1994, and is based within the Children’s Hospital of Michigan and its Children’s Research Center of Michigan (CRCM). Steven Lipshultz M.D. leads the Pediatric Cardiomyopathy Registry and is the interim director of the CRCM. James D. Wilkinson, M.D., M.P.H., is the associate director of the CRCM, second author of this paper, and is the director of the administrative coordinating center of this study at the CRCM. The Children’s Cardiomyopathy Foundation has also funded this paper and study. This paper included centers who cared for these children with dilated cardiomyopathy and lists study authors of this publication who come from the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine, Miami, FL (Paolo Rusconi, M.D., first author); Wayne State University School of Medicine and the Children’s Hospital of Michigan, Detroit, MI; New England Research Institutes, Watertown, MA; Genzyme Corporation, Boston, MA; Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center, Cincinnati, OH; Boston Children’s Hospital and Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA; Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt, Nashville, TN; Washington University, St. Louis, MO; Indiana University School of Medicine, Indianapolis; The Children’s Hospital at Montefiore, Bronx, NY; and Columbia University Medical Center, New York, NY.
###
About the Children’s Hospital of Michigan, www.childrensdmc.org For 130 years, the Children’s Hospital of Michigan has been dedicated to providing high quality care to children and adolescents in a caring, efficient and family-centered environment. With more than 40 pediatric medical and surgical specialty services, the hospital draws patients from nearly every Michigan County, 39 additional states, and 22 countries annually and provides the highest level of pediatric specialty care available for children. The hospital is a national leader in cardiology and heart surgery, neurology and neurosurgery, nephrology, and orthopedics. It is ranked as one of America’s best hospitals for children and sees more children than any hospital in the state. Children’s Hospital of Michigan is one of eight hospitals operated by the Detroit Medical Center (DMC).
MEDIA CONTACT
Register for reporter access to contact detailsCITATIONS
Circulation: Heart Failure, Feb-2017;; R01 HL53392, R01 HL111459, R01 HL109090
RSS