Anti-M2 muscarinic receptor autoantibodies and idiopathic dilated cardiomyopathy.

Idiopathic dilated cardiomyopathy is an often fatal cause of heart failure and has been intensively studied over the last 50 years. One of the main mechanisms for this disease is likely to be autoimmunity-mediated myocardial damage. So far, a variety of autoantibodies have been detected against a number of putative cardiac autoantigens in the sera of patients with dilated cardiomyopathy and have thus received increased attention. This article will attempt to focus on clinical and experimental studies of autoimmunity induced by the M2 muscarinic receptor as a putative autoantigen and their implications in idiopathic dilated cardiomyopathy.