Anti-Heart Antibodies (AHA)

Heart antibodies as detected by IFA have been described in 40% of patients with biopsy proven myocarditis and in 20% of patients with dilated cardiomyopathy. No antibodies have been detected in healthy controls.

Only 4% of patients with ischaemic heart disease are positive for heart antibodies. These autoantibodies generally produce three types of staining reactions: sarcolemmal, diffuse cytoplasmic and striational, producing the so called fibrillar pattern

Anti-Cardiolipin antibodies (ACA)

See separate section on ACA and b₂-GP1 assays.