Medical therapy of pericardial diseases: part II: Noninfectious pericarditis, pericardial effusion and constrictive pericarditis.

The treatment of pericardial diseases is largely empirical because of the relative lack of randomized trials compared with other cardiovascular diseases. The main forms of pericardial diseases that can be encountered in the clinical setting include acute and recurrent pericarditis, pericardial effusion with or without cardiac tamponade, and constrictive pericarditis. Medical treatment should be targeted at the cause as much as possible. In this article, the therapy of more common forms of noninfectious pericarditis (pericarditis in systemic autoimmune diseases and neoplastic pericardial disease), pericardial effusion, and constrictive pericarditis is reviewed. © 2010 Italian Federation of Cardiology.