Cardiomyopathy

Abstract

Many papers have appeared from the African continent dealing with types of non-coronary heart failure of unknown aetiology which are rare in the more sophisticated society of the West. The first of these from South Africa was that by Gillanders (1951) entitled “Nutritional heart disease,” as he felt that malnutrition was of primary aetiological importance. His cases displayed the common signs of congestive failure with enlargement of the whole heart, gallop rhythm and severe oedema and he maintained that liver disease and malnutrition were prime aetiological factors. Subsequently Higginson et al. (1952) described the necropsy findings in 12 cases. Becker et al. (1953) then described a group of hearts in White and Black subjects which they called “Cardiovascular collagenosis with parietal endocardial thrombosis,” and in which they felt that the pathogenesis was basically a disturbance of the connective tissues of the heart, and that, accordingly, the condition should be included in the group of diffuse collagen diseases, along with other well recognized types such as periarteritis nodosa, lupus erythematosus, diffuse scleroderma and rheumatic heart disease.