In patients with rheumatoid arthritis presenting with severe, unexplained heart failure, cardiac rheumatoid nodules should be considered as a potential etiology.
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May support considering cardiac rheumatoid nodules in unexplained heart failure with rheumatoid arthritis; hypothesis-generating case series leaves prevalence and causality open.
Rheumatoid nodules in the heart are unusual specific manifestations of rheumatoid arthritis. This paper describes three cases in which these nodules were found at necropsy. The patients were women with long histories of rheumatoid arthritis, two of whom had significant but unexplained congestive cardiac failure. The rheumatoid nodules were present in the patients' myocardium and in one patient's pericardium. We suggest that in patients with rheumatoid arthritis with severe but unexplained cardiac failure, the possibility of rheumatoid nodules in the heart should be considered.
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Ojeda et al. (1986) studied this question.
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