Ataxia de Friedreich. Avaliação cardiáca de 24 pacientes com diagnóstico clínico e revisão da literatura / Friedreich's ataxia. Cardiac evaluation of 25 patients with clinical diagnosis and literature review

OBJECTIVE - Cardiac evaluation (clinical, electrocardiographic and echocardiographic) of 25 Brazilian patients with clinical diagnosis of Friedreich's ataxia (FA) related to the frequency and the size of GAA repeats (unstable expansion of trinucleotide repeats that results in the disease). METHODS - Clinical and cardiac study including electrocardiogram and echocardiogram of all patients and molecular analysis to detect the frequency and the size of GAA expansion, by polymerase chain reaction analysis. RESULTS - Homozygous GAA expansion was detected in 17 patients (68 percent) -- all typical cases. In 8 (32 percent) cases (6 atypical and 2 typical), no GAA expansion was observed, therefore it was not considered Friedreich's ataxia. All patients with GAA expansion (100 percent) had electrocardiographic abnormalities, and only 25 percent of the cases without GAA expansion had some abnormality on this exam. However, only 6 percent of all patients revealed some signals/symptoms suggestive of cardiac involvement. CONCLUSION - A molecular analysis is essential to confirm the diagnosis of Friedreich's ataxia; however, an adequate cardiac evaluation, including an electrocardiogram, was extremely useful to better screening the patients which should perform these molecular analysis

Achados cardíacos em 31 pacientes com síndrome de Noonan / Cardiac findings in 31 patients with Noonan's syndrome

OBJECTIVE: To evaluate cardiac findings in 31 Noonan syndrome patients. METHODS: Thirty-one (18 males and 13 females)patients from 26 families affected with Noonan's syndrome were evaluated from the cardiac point of view with electrocardiography and echodopplercardiography. RESULTS: Twenty patients had some type of cardiac abnormality. The most frequent was pulmonary valve stenosis followed by hypertrophic myocardiopathy, commonly associated with valve defects. Upper deviation of the QRS axis was observed in 80 percent of these patients. CONCLUSION: In view of the high frequency and diversity of cardiac abnormalities present in Noonan syndrome, cardiac evaluation with electrocardiography and echocardiography should be performed in all patients diagnostically suspected of having this disease