Normal level of spontaneous chromosome breakage in lymphocytes from patients with non-Hodgkin's lymphoma.

The frequency of spontaneous structural chromosome aberrations was studied in phytohemagglutinin-stimulated lymphocytes from 25 untreated patients with non-Hodgkin's lymphoma and 25 controls. In the lymphoma group, the mean gap, break, and gap + break event frequencies (i.e., events per 100 cells) were 1.2, 2.1, and 3.4, respectively. The corresponding rates for the control group were 1.3, 1.5, and 2.8. The mean number of aberrant mitoses per 100 mitoses were 2.5 in lymphoma patients and 2.4 in controls. These differences between patients and controls were not significant (p greater than 0.05). Thus, no evidence of inherent chromosome instability or exposure to clastogenic agents in the lymphoma group was detected.