Studying inflammation in broken heart syndrome

A study into the inflammatory mechanisms and protracted recovery of takotsubo cardiomyopathy

Dr Dana Dawson and her colleagues at the University of Aberdeen are studying stress-induced cardiomyopathy, also known as Takotsubo or ‘broken heart syndrome’. Broken heart syndrome presents like a heart attack, but heart arteries are free of blockages. Although most patients recover, people are at risk of complications like heart failure and death, similar to a heart attack. Many patients continue to have symptoms in the longer term. At present, we don’t understand how Takotsubo syndrome develops, and there are no treatments to prevent more attacks happening. Dr Dawson’s team has discovered that in broken heart syndrome, the heart muscle is persistently swollen, and there is inflammation in the heart and the body. In this project, she wants to study this in more detail. She will find out if inflammation is the key mechanism driving the ‘broken heart’ and preventing recovery from this condition. She will work out how inflammation develops and the timescale that it appears, including detecting inflammation in the heart in patients using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans. She will study if chronic symptoms of broken heart syndrome are due to the inflammatory response. This research will reveal new insights in the cause and mechanism of inflammation in broken heart syndrome and may reveal new ways to treat this condition.