[Celiac disease and lymphoma]

Celiac disease (CD) has been acknowledge as being responsible for numerous secondary pathologies, in particular autoimmune and neoplastic diseases. Whether CD is more prevalent in patients with non-Hodgkin's lymphoma (NHL) than in the normal population is not known. Accordingly, we carried out a study of 86 patients hospitalized in the Section of Oncology, Haematology and Internal Medicine of the Department of Medical, Oncological and Radiological Sciences of the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia and who, between 1988 and 1995 had been diagnosed as affected by NHL. On diagnosis, and before the beginning of antitumour therapy, all the patients were tested for antigliadin (AGA IgA and IgG) and antiendomysium (EMA) antibodies together with total class IgA antibody levels. Our findings showed that none of the 86 patients had an IgA deficit, while one tested positive for AGA IgA (43.9% v.n. < 7.5). The same patient also tested positive for EMA. The extremely high sensitivity and specificity of the AGA IgA and EMA led us to conclude that the patient was affected by CD, although his early death precluded confirmation by biopsy. The presence of one celiac patient among 86 NHL patients examined at the onset of the disease would suggest that CD is not infrequent in NHL. The numbers involved in our study are insufficient for statistical purposes, and we are therefore awaiting the results of a SIGEP multi-centre study into the connection between CD and lymphomas.