IN A RECENT publication1 Thannhauser stated, "The clinical syndrome of idiopathic hyperlipemia in adults with secondary eruptive xanthoma, occasionally accompanied by glycosuria, hitherto was not established as a clinical entity but often confused with hyperlipemia in severe untreated diabetes and accordingly classified as `xanthoma diabeticorum' or `diabetic hyperlipemia.' "
The term hyperlipemia as used here indicates an opaque, milky blood serum in which the neutral fat content is markedly increased; cholesterol and other lipids are generally elevated to a lesser degree. Hyperlipemia may be idiopathic or associated with, and probably due to, other diseases. In both instances xanthoma may appear or "erupt" when there is a high degree of lipemia and regress when it subsides.
Since the occurrence of xanthoma in idiopathic hyperlipemia is a manifestation of the underlying hyperlipemia, its appearance clinically and histologically is the same as that of xanthoma diabeticorum. The lesions are discrete papules, generally pinhead