Heart failure & cardiomyopathiesMechanistic study
Immune Dysregulation as a Key Driver of Peripartum Cardiomyopathy – an Exploratory Advanced Imaging and Biomarker Study
- Mechanistic study
- exploratory
Authors' conclusion
Patients with PPCM exhibited a dysregulated immune response, associated with early myocardial interstitial fibrosis and adverse cardiac remodelling.
Study context
- Population
- Women with newly diagnosed peripartum cardiomyopathy and healthy controls
- Participants
- 10 / 5 / 5
- Comparison
- PPCM vs healthy postpartum and non-postpartum controls
- PPCMn = 10
- Healthy postpartum controls (HPC)n = 5
- Healthy non-postpartum controls (HNPC)n = 5reference
- Outcome
- Acute inflammatory processes by 18FDG-PET-CT, CMR and inflammasome profiling
Main finding
As reported in the abstract
- Higher myocardial and splenic 18FDG uptake in PPCM and HPC vs HNPC
- Myocardial interstitial fibrosis on cardiovascular magnetic resonance (CMR) (elevated T1 time, extracellular volume, LGE mass) solely in PPCM
- Pro-inflammatory cytokine dysregulation in PPCM vs controls (elevated neutrophil-to-lymphocyte ratio, CRP, IL-6, TNF-α, CCL3, hepatocyte growth factor, CXCL10, CSF-1)
Further findings
- PPCM baseline characteristics
- 35.5% · median · IQR 18.1–37.9
PPCM baseline characteristics
- All NYHA class III/IV
Original publication
Immune Dysregulation as a Key Driver of Peripartum Cardiomyopathy – an Exploratory Advanced Imaging and Biomarker Study. Eur J Heart Fail. Published 14 July 2025. doi:10.1002/ejhf.3759
Summarised from the published abstract; every number is checked against it