Lipidoses are heredity disorders, passed from parents to their children, characterized by defects of the digestive system that impair the way the body uses fat from the diet. When the body is unable to properly digest fats, lipids accumulate in body tissues in abnormal amounts.

The digestion, storage, and use of fats from foods is a complex process that involves hundreds of chemical reactions in the body. In most people, the body is already programmed by its genetic code to produce all of the enzymes and chemicals necessary to carry out these functions. These genetic instructions are passed from parents to their offspring during reproduction.

People with lipidoses are born without the genetic codes needed to tell their bodies how to complete a particular part of the fat digestion process. In most of these disorders, the body does not produce a certain enzyme or chemical. Over 30 different disorders...