Genetic and Immunity in Heart Failure

"Echocardiograms will be performed by experienced operators of the echocardiography service.~Inflammatory profile. A single additional blood sample (3 cc) will be collected. Plasma will be isolated from whole blood to determine pro-inflammatory cytokines.~Immunoprofile: Circulating lymphocytes will be separated according to Ficoll gradient (into the two different components of immunity (B and T lymphocytes) with different inflammatory phenotypes.~Evaluation of HS1,2 polymorphisms and estrogen levels: DNA purifications and amplifications will be performed from an aliquot of the single whole blood sample. Genomic DNA will be isolated using the QIAamp DNA Mini and Blood Mini kit (QIAGEN Hilden, Germany) according to the manufacturer's protocol. 9 single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in four specific polymorphic regions of the 3'-1 Regulatory Region (3'RR-1) of the human immunoglobulin (IgH) heavy chain locus will be sequenced."