About our e-newsletters
- Free e-newsletters
- Mayo Clinic expertise
- We do not share your e-mail address
Housecall, our weekly general-interest e-newsletter, keeps you up to date on a wide variety of health topics with timely, reliable, practical information, recipes, blogs, questions and answers with Mayo Clinic experts and more. Our biweekly topic-specific e-newsletters also include blogs, questions and answers with Mayo Clinic experts, and other useful information that will help you manage your health.
Housecall Archives
Mayo Clinic Housecall
Stay up to date on the latest health information.
What you get
- Free weekly e-newsletter
- Mayo Clinic expertise
- Recipes, tools and other helpful information
- We do not share your e-mail address
Symptoms
By Mayo Clinic staffSome people who develop cardiomyopathy have no signs and symptoms during the early stages of the disease. But as the condition advances, signs and symptoms usually appear. Cardiomyopathy symptoms may include:
- Breathlessness with exertion or even at rest
- Swelling of the legs, ankles and feet
- Bloating of the abdomen due to fluid buildup
- Fatigue
- Irregular heartbeats that feel rapid, pounding or fluttering
- Dizziness, lightheadedness and fainting
No matter what type of cardiomyopathy you have, signs and symptoms tend to get worse unless treated. In certain people, this worsening happens quickly, while in others, cardiomyopathy may not worsen for a long time.
When to see a doctor
See your doctor if you have one or more of the signs and symptoms associated with cardiomyopathy. Call 911 or your local emergency number if you experience severe difficulty breathing, fainting or chest pain that lasts for more than a few minutes. Because the condition is sometimes hereditary, your doctor may advise that your family members be examined for cardiomyopathy.
- Cardiomyopathy. American Heart Association. http://www.americanheart.org/presenter.jhtml?identifier=4468. Accessed Jan. 20, 2010.
- Cardiomyopathy. National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute. http://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/health/dci/Diseases/cm/cm_all.html. Accessed Jan. 20, 2010.
- Maron BJ, et al. Contemporary definitions and classification of the cardiomyopathies: An American Heart Association scientific statement from the Council on Clinical Cardiology, Heart Failure and Transplantation Committee; Quality of Care and Outcomes Research and Functional Genomics and Translational Biology Interdisciplinary Working Groups; and Council on Epidemiology and Prevention. Circulation. 2006;113:1807.
- Hare JM. The dilated, restrictive and infiltrative cardiomyopathies. In Libby P. Braunwald's Heart Disease: A Textbook of Cardiovascular Medicine. 8th ed. Philadelphia, Pa.: Saunders Elsevier; 2007. http://www.mdconsult.com/book/player/book.do?method=display&type=bookPage&decorator=header&eid=4-u1.0-B978-1-4160-4106-1..50067-4&uniq=151686941&isbn=978-1-4160-4106-1&sid=867495152#lpState=open&lpTab=contentsTab&content=4-u1.0-B978-1-4160-4106-1..X5001-8--TOP%3Bfrom%3Dcontent%3Bisbn%3D978-1-4160-4106-1%3Btype%3DbookHome. Accessed July 14, 2009.
- Cooper LT. Definition and classification of the cardiomyopathies. http://www.uptodate.com/home/index.html. Accessed Jan. 20, 2010.
- Heart failure. National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute. http://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/health/dci/Diseases/Hf/HF_All.html. Accessed Jan. 20, 2010.
- Restrictive cardiomyopathy. American Heart Association. http://www.americanheart.org/downloadable/heart/1181919434962Restrictive%20Cardiomyopathy_2007.pdf. Accessed Jan. 20, 2010.
- Sorajja P, et al. Outcome of alcohol septal ablation for obstructive hypertrophic cardiomyopathy. Circulation. 2008;118:131.
- Podrid PJ, et al. Secondary and primary prevention of sudden cardiac death in heart failure and cardiomyopathies. http://www.uptodate.com/home/index.html. Accessed Jan. 20, 2010.
Find Mayo Clinic on