Heart Inflammation Treatment

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

Medications

• Antibiotics treat bacterial infections.
• Antifungal medicines treat fungal infections.

Procedures

Heart surgery can repair damage to valves or nearby heart tissue from endocarditis. It may involve removing infected tissues or repairing or replacing the affected valve.

Medications

• Intravenous  immunoglobulin  (IVIG) helps control the body’s immune and inflammatory  response.
• Corticosteroids may treat myocarditis caused by  autoimmune  diseases such as lupus.

Procedures

• An implantable cardioverter defibrillator or pacemaker can control irregular heartbeats or other rhythm abnormalities that don’t go away after a short time.
• A heart transplant may be needed to treat heart failure that does not respond to other treatments.

Medications

• Medicines to relieve pain and reduce inflammation include colchicine, aspirin, and non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) such as ibuprofen.
• 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 in people who have an autoimm autoimmune  disorder such as lupus.

Procedures

• Pericardiocentesis removes extra fluid in the pericardium.
• Pericardiectomy is surgery to remove the pericardium. This treatment is only recommended when medicine or other treatments have not worked. It can be a good option for people who have pericarditis that goes away and then recurs or who have end-stage constrictive pericarditis, where the pericardium becomes thickened and scarred.