What is lipodystrophy?

Also known as: lipodystrophy syndrome.

Lipodystrophy is a rare medical condition in which a child has an abnormality in how the body stores fat. Children with lipodystrophy may have very little body fat (fat loss may range from very small areas or total body absence of fat) but store a lot of fat in other parts of the body like the blood or in internal organs. This is often suspected when thin children present with other disorders such as diabetes, a fatty liver, a large spleen, a fatty heart among other presentations.

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Reviewed by: Jack Wolfsdorf, MD, FAAP

This page was last updated on: 1/29/2019 3:21:13 PM