Hassan Kazma¹*, Malak Fakih², Hassan Ayach², Okba Briman² and Malek Mohammad³

¹Head of Cardiology Division, Bahman Hospital, Lebanon
²Lebanese University Faculty of Medicine, Cardiology Fellow, Lebanon
³Head of Invasive Cardiac Laboratory, Bahman Hospital, Lebanon

*Corresponding Author: Hassan Kazma, Head of Cardiology Division, Bahman Hospital, Lebanon.

Received: May 23, 2024; Published: June 18, 2024

Abstract

AL amyloid cardiomyopathy is one of the most concerning differential diagnosis in patients presenting with symptoms of heart failure (dyspnea, leg edema), and preserved or slightly reduced ejection fraction because early recognition and diagnosis of AL cardiac amyloidosis are crucial to stop the disease’s progression and prevent irreversible outcomes.
When these patients present solely with heart failure (HF) symptoms but have not yet been diagnosed as having AL amyloidosis (plasma cell disorders: multiple myeloma or light chain deposition disease), they are usually referred to cardiologists. Hence, any delay by the cardiologist in diagnosing AL amyloidosis as a potential cause for this cardiomyopathy can lead to increased mortality and morbidity of these patients since survival is typically around 9 months to 2 years after diagnosis if diagnosis was late; however early diagnosis can improve survival with new targeted therapy for AL amyloidosis.
In this case report we present a 4 and a half years follow-up on a 67 years old man who was diagnosed with AL amyloid cardiomyopathy using transthoracic echocardiography. Early diagnosis of multiple myeloma and AL amyloidosis in this patient was possible due to suspicion of cardiac amyloidosis on echocardiography, including left ventricular hypertrophy with sparkling appearance of the myocardium, dilated atria, elevated filling pressure by pulsed Doppler echocardiography, reduced global longitudinal strain with relative apical sparing, and preserved ejection fraction. As a result, targeted therapy was initiated very early and the patient is still alive and ambulating without assistance 4 years and 6 months after the diagnosis.

Keywords: Heart Failure (HF); Amyloidosis (AL)

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Citation

Citation: Hassan Kazma., et al. “Long-Term Prognosis of AL Amyloid Cardiomyopathy: A Four-Year Follow-Up from Early Echocardiographic Diagnosis".Acta Scientific Clinical Case Reports 5.7 (2024): 46-51.

Copyright

Copyright: © 2024 Jenil Patel., et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.