Clinical and Mutational Features of Three Chinese Children with Congenital Generalized Lipodystrophy

OBJECTIVE To investigate the clinical and molecular features of congenital generalized lipodystrophy (CGL) in three Chinese patients with various typical manifestations. METHODS Data on clinical symptoms, results of laboratory analyses, and previous treatments in three Chinese patients were collected by a retrospective review of medical records. All coding regions and adjacent exon-intron junction regions of AGPAT2 and BSCL2 genes were amplified by polymerase chain reaction and sequenced. RESULTS Generalized lipodystrophy, acanthosis nigricans, muscular hypertrophy, severe hypertriglyceridemia, and hepatomegaly were features in all three patients. Patient 1 developed diabetes mellitus at the early age of 2 months and he was the youngest CGL patient reported with overt diabetes. Patient 2 was found to have cardiomyopathy when she was aged 6 months. All of the patients were found to have mutations in the BSCL2 gene, but none of these was a novel mutation. We did not find any AGPAT2 mutation in our patients. CONCLUSION All of our patients exhibited characteristic features of CGL due to mutations in the BSCL2 gene.