Heart Inflammation Treatment

Your doctor may prescribe one or more medicines or procedures to treat heart inflammation, depending on the type and cause of heart inflammation.

Medicines

Antibiotics treat bacterial infections. Side effects of antibiotics depend on which antibiotic is used but may include diarrhea, problems with hearing, balance, kidneys, or decreased white blood cell counts. Some of these side effects may not happen until treatment is finished.
Antifungal medicines treat fungal infections. Sometimes your doctor may recommend lifelong oral antifungal treatment to prevent the infection from returning. Possible side effects of antifungal medicines include allergic reactions, diarrhea, dizziness, itching, blisters or hives, difficulty breathing, weight loss, and skin and eye yellowing called jaundice.

Corticosteroids lower the activity of the body’s immune system. Corticosteroids may be used to treat myocarditis caused by autoimmune diseases such as lupus.
Intravenous immunoglobulin (IVIG) helps control the body’s immune and inflammatory response.

Medicines to relieve pain and reduce inflammation include colchicine, aspirin, and non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) such as ibuprofen. Side effects are mainly gastrointestinal and include abdominal pain, nausea, vomiting, and diarrhea.
Corticosteroids lower the activity of the body’s immune system. With pericarditis, corticosteroids are used only in people who are not responding to or cannot take NSAIDs.
Intravenous immunoglobulin (IVIG) helps control the body’s immune and inflammatory response if you have an autoimmune disorder such as lupus.

Your doctor may consider procedures and surgeries to treat your heart inflammation.

Heart surgery can manage damage to valves or nearby heart tissue from endocarditis. It may involve removal of infected tissues or reconstruction of the heart, including repairing or replacing the affected valve.
Pericardiocentesis removes extra fluid in the pericardium (called pericardial effusion).
An implantable cardioverter defibrillator or pacemaker can control irregular heartbeats that don’t go away after a short time.
Pericardiectomy is surgery to remove the pericardium. This treatment is only recommended when medicine or other treatments have not worked. It can be a successful option for people who have pericarditis that goes away and comes back or who have end-stage constrictive pericarditis, where the pericardium becomes thickened and scarred.