Genetic assessment using whole-exome sequencing for a young hypertriglyceridemic patient with repeated acute pancreatitis

Hypertriglyceridemia is caused not only by environmental factors but also by genetic factors. Severe hypertriglyceridemia is prone to complications of acute pancreatitis. Here, we report a whole-exome sequencing (WES) analysis for a young hypertriglyceridemic patient with recurrent acute pancreatitis and the patient’s mother. A 28-year-old hypertriglyceridemic female was admitted to our hospital. At 23 years old, a health checkup clarified her hypertriglyceridemia. At the age of 26 and 27, she had repeated acute pancreatitis with severe hypertriglyceridemia (serum triglyceride level were 3,888 mg/dL and 12,080 mg/dL, respectively). The patient’s BMI was 29.0 kg/m2, and blood samples under fibrate medication showed triglyceride 451 mg/dL and HbA1c 7.2%. Type V dyslipidemia became more apparent at postprandial state. The WES analysis showed that the patients had two heterozygous variants in Apolipoprotein A5 (APOA5) gene (p.G185C and p.V153M), a heterozygous variant in Apolipoprotein E (APOE) gene (p.R176C), three heterozygous variants in Cystic Fibrosis Transmembrane Conductance Regulator (CFTR) gene (p.T1220I, p.R1453W and p.V470M). On the other hand, her mother, who had moderate hypertriglyceridemia without acute pancreatitis, had a heterozygous variant in APOA5 gene (p.G185C) and two heterozygous variants in CFTR gene (p.T1220I and p.V470M). These results suggest that the more severe pathology of the patient than her mother might be due to the possible compound heterozygous APOA5 variants, the heterozygous APOE variant, and the possible compound heterozygous CFTR variants. In this case, WES analyses were useful to evaluate not only the causative genes of hypertriglyceridemia (APOA5 and APOE) but also the genes involved in the development of acute pancreatitis (CFTR) simultaneously.