title: Chronic Chagas cardiopathy in Chile. Importance of Trypanosoma cruzi burden and clinical evaluation.
abstract: Currently there are no biological markers to indicate which individuals with chronic indeterminate period of Chagas disease develop heart disease and who will remain all his life in this phase. The aim of this survey was to determine if Trypanosoma cruzi burden is related to the presence of heart disease in patients with chronic Chagas disease. 200 patients who had not been treated, 100 with cardiopathy and 100 without, groups A and B respectively, were submitted to clinical study and electrocardiogram, Echo-Doppler was performed for group A in which all important known causes of cardiopathy were discarded. In both groups xenodiagnosis, conventional PCR and quantitative PCR were undertaken. The 100 cardiopaths had 133 electrocardiographic alterations most of them in grade II of the New York Heart Association classification. 98 cardiopaths were classified in grade I by Echo-Doppler and only 2 cases were in grade III due to low ejection fraction. The difference in average parasitemia in patients of group A and B was not significant and no statistically differences were observed between average parasitemia of cardiopaths grade II versus grade I of NYHA. This results allow to characterize same clinical, electrocardiographical and parasitological features in chagasic cardiopaths of Chile.
authors.affiliation: Laboratorio de Parasitología Básico-Clínico, Programa de Biología Celular y Molecular, Instituto de Ciencias Biomédicas, Facultad de Medicina, Universidad de Chile, Santiago, Chile. Electronic address: wapt@med.uchile.cl.
authors.forename: Werner
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Apt
authors.affiliation: Clínica INDISA, Santiago, Chile.
authors.forename: Arturo
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Arribada
authors.affiliation: Laboratorio de Parasitología Básico-Clínico, Programa de Biología Celular y Molecular, Instituto de Ciencias Biomédicas, Facultad de Medicina, Universidad de Chile, Santiago, Chile.
authors.forename: Inés
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Zulantay
authors.affiliation: Laboratorio de Parasitología Básico-Clínico, Programa de Biología Celular y Molecular, Instituto de Ciencias Biomédicas, Facultad de Medicina, Universidad de Chile, Santiago, Chile.
authors.forename: Miguel
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Saavedra
authors.affiliation: Laboratorio de Parasitología Básico-Clínico, Programa de Biología Celular y Molecular, Instituto de Ciencias Biomédicas, Facultad de Medicina, Universidad de Chile, Santiago, Chile.
authors.forename: Catalina
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Muñoz
authors.affiliation: Laboratorio de Parasitología Básico-Clínico, Programa de Biología Celular y Molecular, Instituto de Ciencias Biomédicas, Facultad de Medicina, Universidad de Chile, Santiago, Chile.
authors.forename: Bruno
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Toro
authors.affiliation: Laboratorio de Parasitología Básico-Clínico, Programa de Biología Celular y Molecular, Instituto de Ciencias Biomédicas, Facultad de Medicina, Universidad de Chile, Santiago, Chile.
authors.forename: Bastián
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Vega
authors.affiliation: Escuela de Salud Pública, Facultad de Medicina, Universidad de Chile, Santiago, Chile.
authors.forename: Jorge
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Rodríguez
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D002598:Chagas Cardiomyopathy / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000503:physiopathology*; D002677:Chile / Q000453:epidemiology; D002908:Chronic Disease; D004562:Electrocardiography; D005260:Female; D006331:Heart Diseases / Q000209:etiology*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D018512:Parasitemia / Q000097:blood* / Q000150:complications*; D060888:Real-Time Polymerase Chain Reaction; D014349:Trypanosoma cruzi / Q000235:genetics* / Q000302:isolation & purification*; D020525:Xenodiagnosis / Q000379:methods
keywords: Cardiomyopathy; Chronic chagas disease; PCR; Parasite burden; Trypanosoma cruzi