Maternal cardiomyopathy of pregnancy causing stillbirth

Cardiomyopathy of pregnancy developed in a healthy primigravida at 34 weeks gestation and was followed two weeks later by the spontaneous delivery of a fresh stillbirth. An immunological basis underlying both the mother's condition and the fetal death was suggested by the presence of myocardial antibodies in maternal and cord blood. Reference is made to two other cases in which a similar pathological process may have occurred.