Background: A better understanding of the factors that contribute to heterogeneous outcomes and lifetime disease burden in hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (HCM) is critically needed to improve patient management and outcomes. The SHaRe registry (Sarcomeric Human Cardiomyopathy Registry) was established to provide the scale of data required to address these issues, aggregating longitudinal data sets curated by 8 international HCM specialty centers. Methods: Data on 4591 patients with HCM (2763 genotyped) followed up for a mean of 5.4±6.9 years (24 791 patient-years; median, 2.9 years; interquartile range, 0.3–7.9 years) were analyzed for cardiac arrest, cardiac transplantation, appropriate implantable cardioverter-defibrillator therapy, all-cause death, atrial fibrillation, stroke, New York Heart Association functional class III/IV symptoms (all making up the overall composite end point), and left ventricular ejection fraction <35%. Outcomes were analyzed individually and as composite end points. Results: Median age at diagnosis was 45.8 (interquartile range, 30.9–58.1) years, and 37% of patients were female. Age at diagnosis and sarcomere mutation status were predictive of outcomes. Patients 60 years old. Young patients with HCM (age, 20–29 years) had 4-fold higher mortality than the general US population at a similar age. Patients with pathogenic/likely pathogenic sarcomere mutations had a 2-fold greater risk for adverse outcomes compared with patients without mutations; sarcomere variants of uncertain significance were associated with intermediate risk. Heart failure and atrial fibrillation were the most prevalent adverse events, although typically not emerging for several years after diagnosis. Ventricular arrhythmias occurred in 32% (95% CI, 23–40) of patients 60 years old at diagnosis. Conclusions: The cumulative burden of HCM is substantial and dominated by heart failure and atrial fibrillation occurring many years after diagnosis. Young age at diagnosis and the presence of a sarcomere mutation are powerful predictors of adverse outcomes. These findings highlight the need for close surveillance throughout life and the need to develop disease-modifying therapies.

Genetic studies in the 1980s and 1990s led to landmark discoveries that sarcomere mutations cause both hypertrophic and dilated cardiomyopathies. Sarcomere mutations also likely play a role in more complex phenotypes and overlap cardiomyopathies with features of hypertrophy, dilation, diastolic abnormalities, and non-compaction. Identification of the genetic cause of these important conditions provides unique opportunities to interrogate and characterize disease pathogenesis and pathophysiology, starting from the molecular level and expanding from there. With such insights, there is potential for clinical translation that may transform management of patients and families with inherited cardiomyopathies. If key pathways for disease development can be identified, they could potentially serve as targets for novel disease-modifying or disease-preventing therapies. By utilizing gene-based diagnostic testing, we can identify at-risk individuals prior to the onset of clinical disease, allowing for disease-modifying therapy to be initiated early in life, at a time that such treatment may be most successful. In this section, we review the current application of genetics in clinical management, focusing on hypertrophic cardiomyopathy as a paradigm; discuss state-of-the-art genetic testing technology; review emerging knowledge of gene expression in sarcomeric cardiomyopathies; and discuss both the prospects, as well as the challenges, of bringing genetics to medicine.

Mild hypertrophy but increased arrhythmic risk characterizes the stereotypic phenotype proposed for hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (HCM) caused by thin-filament mutations. However, whether such clinical profile is different from more prevalent thick-filament-associated disease is unresolved. This study aimed to assess clinical features and outcomes in a large cohort of patients with HCM associated with thin-filament mutations compared with thick-filament HCM. Adult HCM patients (age >18 years), 80 with thin-filament and 150 with thick-filament mutations, were followed for an average of 4.5 years. Compared with thick-filament HCM, patients with thin-filament mutations showed: 1) milder and atypically distributed left ventricular (LV) hypertrophy (maximal wall thickness 18 ± 5 mm vs. 24 ± 6 mm; p < 0.001) and less prevalent outflow tract obstruction (19% vs. 34%; p = 0.015); 2) higher rate of progression to New York Heart Association functional class III or IV (15% vs. 5%; p = 0.013); 3) higher prevalence of systolic dysfunction or restrictive LV filling at last evaluation (20% vs. 9%; p = 0.038); 4) 2.4-fold increase in prevalence of triphasic LV filling pattern (26% vs. 11%; p = 0.002); and 5) similar rates of malignant ventricular arrhythmias and sudden cardiac death (p = 0.593). In adult HCM patients, thin-filament mutations are associated with increased likelihood of advanced LV dysfunction and heart failure compared with thick-filament disease, whereas arrhythmic risk in both subsets is comparable. Triphasic LV filling is particularly common in thin-filament HCM, reflecting profound diastolic dysfunction.