Differentiating hyperlipidaemia associated with antiretroviral therapy.

Background: Hyperlipidaemia associated with antiretroviral treatment has led to concerns for an increased cardiovascular risk in HIV-infected patients.

Objective: To assess this cardiovascular risk by comparing the lipoprotein pattern of antiretroviral-treated and untreated HIV-positive patients with patients with familial combined hyperlipidaemia (high cardiovascular risk) or familial hypertriglyceridaemia (low cardiovascular risk).

Methods: Fasting serum samples were drawn from consecutive patients with HIV infection or lipoprotein disorders.

Extracorporeal fibrinogen adsorption--efficacy, selectivity and safety in healthy subjects and patients with foot ulcers.

The elimination of fibrinogen from plasma improves plasma viscosity and whole blood viscosity. For extracorporeal adsorption of fibrinogen the pentapeptide gly-pro-arg-pro-lys was coupled to sepharose CL-4B. Columns containing 100 ml of coupled sepharose CL-4B were used to eliminate fibrinogen from the plasma of 8 healthy male subjects (mean age 27.