Theodore Abraham
University of California-San Francisco, CA·Medicine & Clinical Research
Hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (HCM), a condition in which the heart muscle becomes abnormally thick, is the most common inherited heart disease. About 2 million people in the United States are genetically at risk.
- Fields
Medicine & Clinical Research
Physiology
- Topics
hypertrophic cardiomyopathy
non-obstructive HCM
inherited heart disease
- Grants
- 1 known grant, through Feb 2027
What they work on
- Determine how heart muscle function limits exercise in non-obstructive HCM by measuring regional and global myocardial strain with echocardiography at rest and at peak exercise, and relating it to exercise capacity.
- Evaluate how blood flow through the heart's small vessels relates to exercise capacity, using 13N-ammonia PET scanning to map myocardial perfusion and flow reserve segment by segment.
- Run the EXCITE-HCM randomized trial, comparing 24 weeks of moderate-intensity exercise training with no exercise, and measure changes in VO2max (peak oxygen uptake).
- Test whether training-related gains in exercise tolerance are explained by improvements in myocardial strain and perfusion.
More about the research
Its most common symptom is limited ability to exercise. Doctors have long blamed symptoms on blocked blood outflow from the heart's main pumping chamber. However, about a third of patients have no such blockage, and they have no proven treatment. The team has shown that this non-obstructive form of HCM is linked to dangerous heart rhythms, poor exercise tolerance and worse outcomes. It is also linked to impaired blood flow in the heart's tiny vessels (microvascular ischemia), measured by PET scanning, and to heavy scarring, measured by cardiac MRI.
Why it matters
Patients with non-obstructive hypertrophic cardiomyopathy often cannot stay active and face a high risk of complications with no effective therapy. This work could show whether moderate exercise training is a viable treatment. It could also show how exercise changes heart muscle function and blood flow, which could guide care for a large group of patients with this common inherited heart disease.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
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The school
University of California-San Francisco: 89 labs on PI Pages, $2.1B a year on research, 164 research doctorates a year.
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