Evaluation of the clinical characteristics and prognostic factors of gastrointestinal non-Hodgkin lymphoma based on anatomical sites and histological subtype

Abstract

Background

This study aimed to analyze the clinical characteristics and prognostic factors of patients with non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL) in the gastrointestinal tract.

Methods

This study investigated patients (n = 456) with gastrointestinal tract NHL who had been initially treated in our hospital between January 2018 and December 2021. We compared clinical characteristics and prognostic factors according to the anatomic site of involvement and histologic subtypes.

Results

Gastrointestinal tract involvement was more common in B-cell than T-cell lymphomas (91.7% versus 8.3%). The intestine (n = 237) involvement was more common than the stomach (n = 219). Patients with T-cell lymphoma were more likely to present with advanced disease and B symptoms than B-cell lymphoma. Subgroup survival analysis was conducted for 358 patients whose follow‐up time was more than 2 years, we found that T-cell immunophenotype and elevated serum lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) were independent prognostic factors for survival. Patients with advanced disease were identified as risk factors for relapsed or refractory gastrointestinal tract NHL.

Conclusions

In our subgroup survival analysis, we found that the survival outcomes demonstrated no significant differences between the stomach and intestinal tract NHL. Serum LDH levels and histologic subtypes were independent prognostic factors for the survival of gastrointestinal tract NHL. Advanced diseases were considered risk factors for relapsed or refractory gastrointestinal tract NHL.

Keywords:

• Non-Hodgkin lymphoma
• prognosis
• histopathology
• intestine
• stomach

Ethical approval

All procedures performed in this study involving human participants were following the ethical standards of the Institutional Research Committee and with the 1964 Helsinki Declaration and its later amendments.

Informed Consent

This was retrospective study, thus no informed consent was needed.

Disclosure statement

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

Correction Statement

This article has been republished with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.

Additional information

Funding

This study was supported in part by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant number: 82274268), Joint Funds for the Innovation of Science and Technology of Fujian Province (Grant number: 2022Y0040), Educational Research Project for Young and Middle-aged Teachers in Fujian Province (Grant number: JAT200125), Fujian Provincial Clinical Research Center for Hematological Malignancies (Grant number: 2020Y2006) and the Key Clinical Specialty Discipline Construction Program of Fujian, China (Min Wei Ke Jiao 2012 No. 149).