Short Term Effects of Atenolol in Patients with Dilated Cardiomyopathy
RUNGROJ KRITTA Y APHONG, M.D*, CHARUWAN KANGKAGATE,M.S*, NITHI MAHANONDA, M.D*, REWAT PHANKINGTHONGKUM, M.D**, SUPHACHAI CHAITHIRAPHAN, M.D*,
Affiliation : * Her Majesty's Cardiac Center, ** Division of Cardiology, Department of Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, Siriraj Hospital. Mahidol University. Bangkok 10700, Thailand.
Dilated cardiomyopathy is a common cause of heart failure with systolic dysfunction. Medications used to treat this condition are usually for symptomatic relief. We studied the effect of atenolol in heart failure caused by dilated cardiomyopathy in a double blinded randomized fashion. There were 17 males and 5 females. All patients underwent right and left heart cathe- terization, coronary angiography, endomyocardial biopsy, exercise testing and doppler echo- cardiography. By 3 months, atenolol significantly reduced resting and exercise heart rate and pulmonary capillary wedge pressure. There was no difference in exercise capacity. We conclude from this study that atenolol improve hemodynamic condition in patients with dilated cardio- myopathy without improving exercise capacity during this short observertion period.
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