Cardiac manifestations of acquired immune deficiency syndrome: a 1991 update.

Cardiac involvement is being identified more often clinically and at autopsy in patients with AIDS. Recent estimates suggest that in the United States as many as 5000 patients per year may have cardiac complications resulting from HIV infection. Patients with AIDS may have pericardial, myocardial, and/or endocardial disease. Pericardial tamponade and/or constriction may be related to neoplasms, infections, or nonspecific effusions. Myocardial dysfunction may result from specific neoplastic infiltration or myocarditis. Particularly intriguing is the role of HIV-1 in the nonspecific myocarditis and dilated cardiomyopathy that occurs in patients with AIDS. As in other debilitating conditions patients with AIDS can have nonbacterial thrombotic endocarditis. Infective endocarditis may be a complication, especially in AIDS associated with intravenous drug abuse. Most patients with AIDS have no overt clinical evidence of cardiac disease. When cardiac dysfunction does develop, the signs and symptoms are often misinterpreted to be the result of noncardiac causes (pulmonary failure or infection) which can mimic heart failure. This review is intended to alert the reader to the cardiac manifestations of AIDS, which present a number of diagnostic and therapeutic challenges.