Cardiac involvement in relapsing polychondritis.

Relapsing polychondritis is a rare disease characterized by recurrent inflammatory lesions involving cartilaginous structures, the eyes, the ears and the cardiovascular system. Valvar insufficiency represents the most common of the cardiac abnormalities and appears in 8 percent of patients. We describe two patients having relapsing polychondritis with cardiac involvement. One of them required valvar substitution and died 6 months after surgery.