Secchiero P, Bonino L D, Lusso P, Abele M C, Reato G, Kerim S, Palestro G, Zauli G, Valente G
Institute of Human Anatomy, University of Ferrara, Italy.
Br J Haematol. 1998 Jun;101(3):492-9. doi: 10.1046/j.1365-2141.1998.00718.x.
Several lines of evidence have pointed to the involvement of a viral agent in the pathogenesis of Hodgkin's disease (HD). Therefore we investigated the presence of human herpesvirus type 7 (HHV-7) in 53 cases of HD by polymerase chain reaction (PCR), DNA in situ hybridization (ISH) and immunohistochemistry. HHV-7 DNA was frequently detected (68% of the cases) in HD biopsies by PCR independently of the histological type, whereas only 32% (P<0.05) of positive cases were found in 19 reactive lymph nodes. However, by applying the quantitative PCR technique, the majority of the samples showed a low level of viral load. Moreover, ISH for HHV-7 DNA was positive in a low number of small T lymphocytes and consistently negative in Hodgkin and Reed-Sternberg (HRS) cells, which appeared negative for HHV-7 also at immunohistochemistry. These results indicate that the high frequency of HHV-7 infection in HD: (i) is probably non-productive, (ii) mainly involves small lymphocytes belonging to the T-lineage, and (iii) is probably due to the recruitment of non-malignant reactive cells in HD tissue.
