[Lymphomas in children and adolescents]

Non Hodgkin lymphomas in the pediatric population are a heterogeneous group of tumors with distinct pathologic, immunologic and clinical characteristics. Over the past three decades, significant advancements have been made in the molecular characterization of these disorders. More than 90% of pediatric childhood non Hodgkin lymphomas are high grade lymphomas belonging to four major histologic subtypes, Burkitt lymphoma, diffuse large B-cell lymphoma, lymphoblastic lymphoma and anaplastic large cell lymphoma. With the use of intensive multiagent chemotherapy, most patients can now be cured and long-term event free survival is above 80% in most histologic subtypes. The identification of molecular events associated with carcinogenesis leads to the identification of novel targeted therapy which should allow a further improvement of treatment including a reduction of treatment burden in early stages and improvement of survival in advanced stages.