Disappearance of the Epstein-Barr virus in a relapse of Hodgkin's disease.

作者信息

Delecluse H J, Marafioti T, Hummel M, Dallenbach F, Anagnostopoulos I, Stein H

机构信息

Consultation and Reference Center for Lymph Node Pathology and Hematopathology, Institute of Pathology, Klinikum Benjamin Franklin, Free University of Berlin, Germany.

出版信息

J Pathol. 1997 Aug;182(4):475-9. doi: 10.1002/(SICI)1096-9896(199708)182:4<475::AID-PATH878>3.0.CO;2-6.

Hodgkin's disease (HD) is associated with the Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) in approximately half of cases. This is a report of a case of nodular sclerosing HD of the B-cell type that was associated with EBV in the initial manifestation, but was found to be EBV-negative in the relapse of the tumour. Both tumours displayed similar clinical, pathological, and immunohistochemical features. This finding implies that in a given individual EBV can be lost from malignant tumours and therefore shows that the EBV infection is not required to maintain neoplastic growth of HD tumour cells.