Severe hypertriglyceridemia and pancreatitis when estrogen replacement therapy is given to hypertriglyceridemic women.

Our specific aim was to assess severe hypertriglyceridemia and pancreatitis that occurred when postmenopausal estrogen replacement therapy (ERT) or tamoxifen had been given by their physicians to women with preexisting, usually covert, primary familial hypertriglyceridemia. We retrospectively studied 31 women referred for diagnosis and therapy of hypertriglyceridemia over 2.75 years whose initial visit fasting plasma triglyceride levels were >750 mg/dl. Of the 31 women with hypertriglyceridemia, 12 (39%) had been given exogenous estrogen by their physicians (11 ERT, one tamoxifen)