A clinical approach to dyslipidaemia

Abstract

Life as we currently know it could not exist without lipids. For example, the much-maligned cholesterol molecule plays critical roles in membrane organisation, signal transduction, bile acid and steroid hormone synthesis – and these are just a few of its many roles. The critical importance of cholesterol is underscored by the large number of genes that regulate its metabolism and the devastating clinical consequences of the (luckily) very rare disorders in which ‘abnormal’ sterol molecules accumulate or cholesterol synthesis is disrupted. Yet excessive circulating cholesterol is an important
contributor to atherosclerosis, which is the leading cause of death in the developed world and rapidly increasing in the developing world.