[Electrocardiographic disorders in diverse clinical variations of scleroderma]

The electrocardiograms of 130 patients affected by scleroderma, 117 with systemic sclerosis (67 with diffuse and 50 with limited form) and 13 with localized scleroderma were analyzed. ECG was normal in 44.6% of cases, respectively in 39.3% with systemic sclerosis and in 92.3% with localized scleroderma. The more frequent electrocardiographic abnormalities were supraventricular and ventricular premature beats, right bundle branch block, left anterior hemiblock, low QRS voltages, ST-T wave abnormalities and Q or QS aspects. All the abnormalities above resulted to be more frequent in the patients with diffuse systemic sclerosis in comparison to the patients with limited systemic sclerosis. Our results confirm that the cardiac involvement appears to be much more serious in the diffuse systemic sclerosis.