The clinical significance of senile cardiac amyloidosis: a prospective clinico-pathological study.

The heart was screened for amyloid deposits in an unselected post-mortem series of 244 patients over 60 who had been admitted to a geriatric department. Cardiac amyloidosis was found in 121 cases (49-6 per cent) but was limited to minor atrial involvement in 55 (22-5 per cent). The prevalence and severity of cardiac amyloidosis were significantly related to age and sex, females having the higher prevalence (56 per cent compared with 37 1/2 per cent). Cardiac amyloidosis was also significantly correlated with the occurrence of atrial fibrillation and of cardiac failure during the period of admission to hospital. Cardiac amyloidosis showed no significant correlations with other factors studied which included ECG evidence of left ventricular hypertrophy, ischaemia and bundle branch block, pathological evidence of cardiac enlargement or ischaemia, diagnosis of malignant disease, generalized wasting and the occurrence of digitalis toxicity.