Dilated Cardiomyopathy in Children: Early Detection and Treatment

Cardiomyopathy is segregated into primary and secondary categories, leading to different phenotypes, including dilated, hypertrophic, and restrictive patterns. Dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM) is a mixed bag of heart diseases with the unique features of cardiac dilatation and subnormal to poor myocardial contractility. Dilated cardiomyopathy in the pediatric age group is generally characterized by unobstructed, dilated, and contracting left ventricular chamber defects and is associated with heart failure. Other causes include genetic juvenile-onset cardiomyopathy, drug-induced cardiomyopathy, stress-induced cardiomyopathy, hemochromatosis, endocrine causes (thyroid disorder and pheochromocytoma), autoimmune diseases, and nutritional deficiencies (selenium and thiamine). It is characterized by thinning of the left ventricle, a dilated left ventricle or biventricular dilatation, left ventricular systolic dysfunction, left ventricular diastolic dysfunction, global hypokinesia, and cardiomegaly (seen on a chest X-ray). Decreased cardiac output leads to fatigue, cachexia, narrow pulse pressure, dicrotic pulse/hypokinetic pulse, dyspnea, cool extremities, decreased blood supply to the brain (cognitive dysfunction), and reduced blood supply to the kidney (renal failure). Left ventricular diastolic dysfunction can result in dyspnea, orthopnea, and paroxysmal nocturnal dyspnea. Cardiomyopathy can also occur with or without left ventricular dysfunction, as in left ventricular non-compaction cardiomyopathy (LVNC), which is a rare heart disease occurring due to two (likely) pathogenic nonsense mutations: DSG2-p.S363X and TBX20-p.D278X. The study of familial forms of LVNC is helpful for risk prediction and genetic counseling of relatives. Right ventricular chamber failure can be identified on the electrocardiogram as sinus tachycardia and non-specific ST/T changes. The complications include arrhythmia (atrial fibrillation) and thromboembolism (left ventricular mural thrombosis). It is of utmost importance in the field of heart transplantation as the definitive treatment of the disease. Heart transplantation is now an acceptable treatment option for patients with dilated cardiomyopathy. This short review highlights different methods for the detection and diagnosis of dilated cardiomyopathy and the treatment modalities available for the same.