[Secondary disorders of lipid metabolism, metabolic syndrome and familial combined hyperlipidemia].

Secondary hyperlipoproteinemias are found in connection with other primary organic diseases. Typical examples are those seen with diabetes mellitus, liver and kidney diseases. In addition there are changes induced by hormonal dysfunctions such as hypothyroidism, by the use of oral contraceptives or in postmenopausal women. During pregnancy there is a physiological transient increase in lipoproteins. In addition to primary organic diseases there are a number of exogenous factors such as obesity, malnutrition and alcohol abuse causing hyperlipidemia. The relation between hypertension and hyperlipidemia described as familial dyslipidemic hypertension is less well known. Obesity, hypertension, dyslipidemia, hyperuricemia and impaired glucose tolerance are the basic conditions of the metabolic syndrome. Familial combined hyperlipidemia is a genetically determined, dyslipidemic syndrome with a high prevalence among patients with coronary artery disease and stroke. As there are some links between familial combined hyperlipidemia and secondary hyperlipoproteinemias, this disease entity is discussed together in this paper. Familial combined hyperlipidemia is metabolically, genetically and by this on a molecular level closely linked to familial dyslipidemic hypertension as well as the metabolic syndrome. The exact mechanism of this disease is currently unknown.