When and How to Diagnose Fabry Disease in Clinical Pratice

Fabry disease is a frequent lysosomal storage disorder secondary to the deficiency of alpha-galactosidase A enzyme. This X-linked genetic disease realizes progressive and systemic manifestations that affect both male and female. Fabry disease may present as “classical”, as “late-onset” or “non-classical” forms. Symptoms and organ involvements of classical Fabry disease are acral pain crisis, cornea verticillata, hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, stroke and chronic kidney disease with proteinuria. Other common symptoms are often poorly recognized, such as gastrointestinal or ear involvements. In classical Fabry disease, symptoms first appear during childhood or during teenage years in males, but later in females. Patients with non-classical or late-onset Fabry disease have delayed manifestations or a single-organ involvement. Diagnosis is therefore difficult when classical organ involvements are missing, in paucisymptomatic patients or in late-onset forms. Recognition of Fabry disease is important because effective treatments are available. They have to be prescribed early. In male, diagnosis is made with alpha-galactosidase A enzyme activity dosage in leukocyte, that is very low or null in classical forms and under 30 percent in late-onset forms. Diagnosis is more challenging in females who may express normal residual enzyme activity. Other plasmatic biomarkers, such as lyso-globotriaosylceramide are interesting, especially in females. In this review, we aimed to summarize main clinical manifestations of Fabry disease to know when to evoke Fabry disease and propose a practical diagnosis algorithm to know how to diagnose.