Clinical Approach to Sudden Cardiac Death Syndromes

Clinical cardiologists are encountering an important challenge in the care of families with inherited cardiac diseases. The majority of the inherited cardiac diseases causing sudden death express themselves at variable ages in the form of altered muscle function for instance hypertrophic or dilated cardiomyopathy or in the form of arrhythmias, including Brugada syndrome and long QT syndrome. Clinical and genetic research is continuously ongoing not only to identify those at risk but also to better define their level of risk. Deciding on the most appropriate clinical tests is a challenge in inherited diseases. It is in this situation that specialized clinical-genetic clinics have appeared to provide a complete assessment of patients and family members. The clinicians in the community, faced with a growing number of questions and doubts in the caring of these individuals, are increasingly using the expertise of these centers to address the clinical decisions in their patients.