Morphometrical analysis of autopsy hearts of congestive cardiomyopathy.

To analyse the morphological changes of 25 autopsy hearts of 18 males, 7 females including 3 children with congestive cardiomyopathy (COCM), measurements of the heart weight, chamber volume, wall thickness, circumference of the valvular annulus, thickness of the valvular cusp and transverse diameter of the muscle fiber were performed. The mean onset of heart failure was 38 years of age, the mean duration 60 months, the mean age of death 43 years, the mean heart weight 513 g and the mean total chamber volume 286 ml, the mean chamber volume being 89 ml in the left ventricle (LV), 72 ml in the right ventricle (RV), 71 ml in the right atrium (RA) and 55 ml in the left atrium (LA). Various kinds of correlation among these measured parameters were analysed statistically. There was a significant correlation between the heart weight and the total chamber volume (P less than 0.05), the volume of LV and RV (p less than 0.05), the volume of RV and RA (P less than 0.01), the volume of RA and the circumference of the TV annulus (P less than 0.0001) and the volume of LA and the circumference of the MV annulus (P less than 0.001). These data were also compared according to the mode of death (arrhythmia versus heart failure) and the duration of survival (more than 5 years versus 5 years or less). No statistically significant differences between the above groups were found except for the total chamber volume.