Hodgkin's Lymphoma in Pakistan : A Clinico-epidemiological Study of 658 cases at a Cancer Center in Lahore

Objectives: To study the clinico-epidemiological profile of Hodgkin’s lymphoma (HL) in Pakistan. Patients and
Methods: We retrospectively studied all histopathologically proven cases of HL, who presented between Dec 1995 toJune 2003 at Shaukat Khanum Memorial Cancer Hospital and Research Hospital (SKMCH & RC). All the relevantinformation was obtained through the hospital based cancer registry and medical records of the selected patients.
Results: Six hundred and fifty eight histopathologically confirmed cases of HL were identified. There were 505 malesand 153 females, with a male to female ratio of 3.3: 1. Patients ranged in age from 1 year - 84 years. The mean age atpresentation was 23.8 years. Three hundred and twenty cases (48.6%) belonged to age group ≤ 18 years and 338cases (51.4%) were > 18 years of age. Histopathologically, mixed cellularity (MC) constituted 63.8% of cases, followedby nodular sclerosis (NS) 19.9%, lymphocyte predominant (LP) 7.3% and lymphocyte depleted (LD) 1.2%. Earlystage (stage I and II) disease was present in 43.9% of patients at presentation, while 56.1% patients presented withadvanced stage (stage III and IV). The majority of patients (81.2%) presented with cervical lymphadenopathy.
Conclusion: The clinico–epidemiological pattern of Hodgkin’s lymphoma in Pakistan manifested is similar to thatobserved in other developing countries, with male predominance, mixed cellularity as the commonest histologicaltype, advanced stage at presentation and absence of bimodal age distribution.