ABSTRACT
Cardiac amyloidosis is a well-known condition, which has been reported with varying incidence rates. Systemic amyloidosis of AL and transthyretin type is often associated with amyloid deposition in heart valves, in addition to blood vessels and myocardium. There is also another type of cardiac amyloidosis restricted entirely to the heart valves and can be found in valves, surgically removed for chronic valvular disease. The deposits are small and restricted to the areas of scarring and calcification. Proteins electrophoresed on SDS-PAGE gels were blotted onto a nitrocellulose membrane and exposed to primary antibodies followed by horse radish peroxidase-conjugated swine anti-rabbit immunoglobulin diluted 1:10 000. Since tryptic fragments covered different parts of this large protein, it is highly unlikely that it is the precursor protein but complement factor C3 might be involved in the pathogenesis of the amyloid in calcified heart valves.
