Lipid management and physician visit patterns in a real-world sample of patients with severe hypertriglyceridemia

s 315 TG.500 mg/dL between 1/1/2007 and 4/30/2013 were placed into three mutually exclusive cohorts based on the first available TG measurement (index date): TG$1500 (Cohort A); 750#TG,1500 (Cohort B); and 500,TG,750 mg/dL (Cohort C). Patients were required to have $12 months of pre-index (baseline) and $12 months of post-index (follow-up) health plan eligibility. Dyslipidemia diagnoses were assessed using ICD-9-CM codes (272.xx). Treatment patterns were assessed descriptively during follow-up in a subset of patients who had not received TG-targeted treatments (fibrates, fish oils, niacin) at baseline. Results: We identified a total of 1,964 patients with TG$1500 (Cohort A), 7,432 with 750#TG,1500 (Cohort B), and 17,500 with 500,TG,750 mg/dL (Cohort C). Across all cohorts, patients were young (mean age 46-48 years) and mostly men (75-80%). The majority of patients in each cohort were diagnosed with ‘‘Other and unspecified hyperlipidemia’’ at both baseline and follow-up. ‘‘Hypertriglyceridemia’’ was noted in ,10% of patients at baseline and w20% of patients at follow-up. Between 20-40% of TG-treatment-na€ive patients did not initiate any pharmacotherapy within 4 months of the index date. Among those who did, approximately half received statins as their first-