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ORPHA:75233

Wolman disease

low confidenceSubtype of disorder

Publications

1,139

Trials

8

Interventional, condition-specific

Researchers

1,203

Distinct authors in sample

Gene link

—

Readiness

2/6

Stages with a signal

Clinical definition (Orphanet)

A severe form of lysosomal acid lipase deficiency characterized by rapidly lipid accumulation in organs and tissues that presents in the or period with massive , liver failure, diarrhea/steatorrhea and vomiting.

How rare: How common this is has not been clearly measured.

Orphanet entry

Cross-references

Joined from Mondo / Orphanet. MeSH labels may enter searches; UMLS / OMIM / NCIT are stored for reference.

Additional Mondo synonyms (2)

Wolman disease with hypolipoproteinemia and acanthocytosis · Wolman's disease

Research stages

Trial readiness signals

Where this condition sits on an open-data research pipeline — not how close a treatment is, and not medical advice. Empty stages often mean “not in these databases under this Mondo ID,” not “impossible.”

2/6 stages with a signal

An interventional trial matched this condition name on ClinicalTrials.gov — see trials below.

  1. Gene identifiedNot found

    No GenCC disease–gene assertion in this build

  2. LiteraturePresent

    1,139 matched papers (572 in last 10 years) Source

  3. Phenotype characterisedNot checked

    Not yet enriched from Monarch / HPO

  4. Animal modelNot checked

    Not yet enriched from Monarch / Alliance

  5. Orphan designationNot checked

    FDA/EMA orphan-drug designation not enriched yet

  6. Interventional trialPresent

    8 matched on ClinicalTrials.gov (1 recruiting in sample)

Biology

Genes and phenotypes

Gene–disease validity from GenCC, plus phenotypes and animal models joined from Monarch Initiative via Mondo ID — not a clinical diagnosis aid.

Do we know what causes it?

Not yet — the cause hasn't been pinned down in GenCC.

No strong gene–disease assertion joined for this Orphanet entity.

Phenotypes (Monarch / HPO)

Not enriched in this build — Monarch phenotype joins were not run for this record.

Animal models (Monarch / Alliance)

Not enriched in this build.

Literature

Is anyone studying this?

1,139

1,139 papers have been published on this condition. That is a real research literature — still far smaller than common diseases (breast cancer: over 700,000 papers). Median papers in the last 10 years for a rare disease in this dataset (publications denominator n=5449) is 41.

1,139 papers since the earliest indexed year in this search — median last-10-year count for a rare disease in this dataset is 41 (publications denominator n=5449).

572 in the last 10 years · low confidence

Phrase hits: 1,139 · MeSH hits: 17

Open Europe PMC search

Who's working on it?

1,203

Distinct author names in 200 sampled papers — named people below.

Who's working on it?

People publishing on this condition (sampled Europe PMC records). Affiliation is the most recent found in that sample.

  1. 01
    Jones SA12 papers · 2026

    Faculty of Biology, Medicine and Health, Division of Psychology and Mental Health, School of Health Sciences, Manchester Academic Health Science Centre, The University of Manchester, 2nd Floor Zochonis Building, Brunswick Street, Manchester, M13 9NY, UK.

    Papers in Europe PMC
  2. 02
    Abel F8 papers · 2026

    Department of Global Medical Affairs, Alexion, AstraZeneca Rare Disease, Boston, Massachusetts, USA.

    Papers in Europe PMC
  3. 03
    Brassier A6 papers · 2026

    Reference Center of Inherited Metabolic Diseases, Necker Enfants Malades Hospital, Imagine Institute, University Paris Descartes, AP-HP, 75015 Paris, France.

    Papers in Europe PMC
  4. 04
    Ghosh A6 papers · 2025

    Manchester Centre for Genomic Medicine, Manchester University NHS Foundation Trust, Oxford Road, Manchester, UK.

    Papers in Europe PMC
  5. 05
    Balwani M4 papers · 2025

    Department of Genetics and Genomic Sciences, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York, New York, USA.

    Papers in Europe PMC
  6. 06
    Bekri S4 papers · 2021

    Department of Metabolic Biochemistry, Rouen University Hospital, Rouen, France.

    Papers in Europe PMC
  7. 07
    Church HJ4 papers · 2025

    Willink Biochemical Genetics Laboratory, St Mary's Hospital, Manchester University NHS Foundation Trust, Manchester M13 9WL, UK.

    Papers in Europe PMC
  8. 08
    Cooper JA4 papers · 2025

    Willink Biochemical Genetics Laboratory, St Mary's Hospital, Manchester University NHS Foundation Trust, Manchester M13 9WL, UK.

    Papers in Europe PMC
  9. 09
    Lacaille F4 papers · 2026

    Gastroenterology Hepatology Nutrition Unit, Hôpital Necker-Enfants Malades, Paris, France.

    Papers in Europe PMC
  10. 10
    Marulkar S4 papers · 2022

    Alexion Pharmaceuticals, Inc., New Haven, CT.

    Papers in Europe PMC

Clinical research

Is a treatment being tested?

8

interventional trials for this specific condition

8 interventional trials matched this specific condition name; 1 currently recruiting in our sample.

Data as of 27 July 2026

8 interventional trials — more than 73% of diseases in the trials denominator have none at all (5114 of 7003; this disease is at the 90.6th percentile).

low confidence · 90.6th percentile (trials denominator)

Recruiting interventional trials

From the matched ClinicalTrials.gov set

8 interventional trials matched after quoted-phrase search and title/condition post-filter.

Observational and natural-history studies

7 observational studies match this condition. These do not test a treatment and are not counted in the interventional-trial headline, but they are genuine research: natural-history work often defines the endpoints needed for a future rare-disease trial, and families may be able to enroll.

Recruiting or not-yet-recruiting

Open the complete matched search on ClinicalTrials.gov

Where to find support

We do not yet link condition-specific patient organisations. These umbrella groups support undiagnosed and ultra-rare families:

India — NPRD

Last verified 2026-07-26

Directly listed under NPRD Group 3.

Group 3 — high-cost / lifelong therapy with careful selection

Up to ₹50 lakh per patient

Financial support at notified Centres of Excellence is the figure commonly cited in recent MoHFW/PIB statements. Many Group 3 patients also use the MoHFW voluntary-contribution / crowdfunding portal.

Eligibility and patient selection rules change. Verify with a CoE; the crowdfunding portal is a separate mechanism from CoE funding. Verify

Centres of Excellence (15)
  • All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) — New Delhi, Delhi
  • Maulana Azad Medical College — New Delhi, Delhi
  • Sanjay Gandhi Post Graduate Institute of Medical Sciences — Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh
  • Post Graduate Institute of Medical Education and Research (PGIMER) — Chandigarh, Chandigarh
  • Centre for DNA Fingerprinting & Diagnostics with Nizam’s Institute of Medical Sciences — Hyderabad, Telangana
  • King Edward Memorial Hospital — Mumbai, Maharashtra
  • Institute of Post-Graduate Medical Education and Research (IPGMER) — Kolkata, West Bengal
  • Centre for Human Genetics with Indira Gandhi Hospital — Bengaluru, Karnataka
  • Institute of Child Health and Hospital for Children (ICH & HC) — Chennai, Tamil Nadu
  • All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) — Jodhpur, Rajasthan
  • Sree Avittam Thirunal Hospital (SAT), Government Medical College — Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala
  • All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) — Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh
  • Regional Institute of Medical Sciences (RIMS) — Imphal, Manipur
  • All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) — Patna, Bihar
  • Assam Medical College & Hospital — Dibrugarh, Assam

Voluntary contributions / crowdfunding (separate from CoE funding): https://rarediseases.mohfw.gov.in/

Hand-curated for this project. ORPHAcode mappings are best-effort and may be incomplete or imprecise for umbrella categories. Parent (Mondo) matches mean the policy lists a broader category — confirm eligibility with a Centre of Excellence. Financial entitlements summarised from public policy statements and may change. This is not official government guidance.

How we counted this

Europe PMC query (preferred label + any corrected label + Orphanet and Mondo exact synonyms, stoplisted; unioned with resolved MeSH labels when available). UMLS / OMIM / NCIT cross-references are stored on the overview but are not added to the query string.

"Wolman disease" OR "Wolman disease with hypolipoproteinemia and acanthocytosis" OR "Wolman's disease"

Run this search on Europe PMC

MeSH descriptor terms unioned into the query: [OBSOLETE] Wolman Disease with Hypolipoproteinemia and Acanthocytosis; Wolman Disease

ClinicalTrials.gov query (quoted phrases + MeSH via query.cond, plus recall-expansion terms when used):

"Wolman disease" OR "Wolman disease with hypolipoproteinemia and acanthocytosis" OR "Wolman's disease" OR "[OBSOLETE] Wolman Disease with Hypolipoproteinemia and Acanthocytosis"

Interventional trials matched via: both, phrase (mesh = registered under a MeSH descriptor no name phrase would catch; recall-expansion = gene / selected parent terms used only for trials).

Study-type breakdown: 8 interventional · 7 observational · 0 expanded access. Only interventional studies enter the trial headline.

Query health: ok — strategies attempted: phrase, mesh; with hits: phrase, mesh

Run this search on ClinicalTrials.gov

Confidence reasoning

  • Preferred label is short or not clearly distinctive
  • No synonyms dropped by stoplist
  • No label/synonym collisions with other diseases in this corpus
  • Publication count (1139) is extremely high with unknown/missing prevalence — treat as possible over-matching, not proven research intensity

Ingested 2026-07-27T01:46:08.220Z