Clinical and age peculiarities of non-Hodgkin’s lymphomas with primary involvement of lymph nodes

Abstract

Background: Non-Hodgkin’s lymphomas (NHLs) are a heterogenous group of malignant tumors developing from the lymphoid tissue and having a wide range of clinical manifestations and varied evolution and prognosis. Material and methods: We have studied the clinical peculiarities of 228 patients of different age groups with NHLs and a primary involvement of lymph nodes. Results: The frequency of the lymph nodes primary involvement has constituted 37.6%. It has been established that NHLs most frequently had their primary onset in the peripheral lymph nodes (61.8%), less frequently – in the abdominal (23.3%) and mediastinal (14.9%) ones. NHLs most frequently begin their development in the peripheral lymph nodes, first in patients over 60 years old (84.6%), in the abdominal lymph nodes – in children (57.2%), in the mediastinum – in children and people aged between 19 and 39 (48.2%). Conclusions: Children develop only aggressive NHL forms, these forms also predominate in adults. Aggressive NHLs in adults have been most often diagnosed in the patients having the primary tumor focus location in the mediastinal and abdominal lymph nodes. The frequency of indolent NHLs is higher in the cases with the primary involvement of the peripheral lymph nodes, the patients’ age being over 60. Metastases in the bone marrow have most frequently been recorded in NHL patients with the primary involvement of peripheral lymph nodes (53.5%). The involvement of CNS has taken place most frequently in the patients with NHLs, having the onset in the abdominal (34.4%) and mediastinal (30.0%) lymph nodes.