Cardiac muscle changes may also occur in some systemic diseases such as hyper thyroidism . While the walls appear of normal or even reduced thickness, the volume of myocardium is in fact increased - due to eccentric hypertrophy. In contrast, another group is characterised by more obvious hypertrophy ,with less marked dilatation of the chambers. This is termed hypertrophic cardiomyopathy - due to concentric hypertrophy. The incidence of dilated cardiomyopathy in cats is much less since the discovery of the role of dietary deficiency of taurine .
Aortic thromboembolism is a well-recognised complication of cardiomyopathy in cats.