Ultrastructural evidence of intercalated disc remodelling in arrhythmogenic right ventricular cardiomyopathy: an electron microscopy investigation on endomyocardial biopsies.

Aims: The ultrastructural features of the myocardium in arrhythmogenic right ventricular cardiomyopathy (ARVC) have not been systematically investigated so far. The recent discovery of gene mutations encoding intercalated disc proteins prompted us to perform a transmission electron microscopy study on endomyocardial biopsies.

Methods And Results: Twenty-one ARVC probands who fulfilled the international Task Force diagnostic criteria underwent right ventricular endomyocardial biopsy and screening of desmosome (D) protein encoding genes.