Incidence of Coxsackie virus infection in patients with dilated cardiomyopathy.

A total of 127 patients, divided into two groups, were examined; one was made up by patients with dilated cardiomyopathy (D-CMP) (n: 32), the other one by patients with myocarditis and pericarditis ("other cardiopathies") (n: 95). A control group of healthy subjects (n: 278) consisted of blood donors. Infection with Coxsackie viruses (B1, B2, B3, B4, B5, B6, A7, A9) was followed up serologically using virus-neutralizing antibodies and/or IgM class virus-specific antibodies. Actual Coxsackie virus infection was demonstrated in almost half of patients. Seventeen (53.1%) out of the 32 D-CMP patients (with a negative history of Coxsackie virus infection) had a positive serological finding. The most frequently isolated Coxsackie virus was, B4. In the group of "other cardiopathies", a positive serological finding was in 42 patients (44.2%) with the incidence of B1 and B4 viruses being the highest and identical. Compared with data obtained in healthy controls, the incidence of Coxsackie virus infection in the two follow-up groups of patients was statistically highly significant (p less than 0.001).