[Treatment of Hodgkin's disease]

The data pertinent to 101 patients with Hodgkin's disease who had been subjected to splenectomy and combined radiation therapy and chemotherapy are analysed. The efficacy of the treatment was relatively dependent on the initial localization and the degree of the generalization and aggressiveness of the disease. Variations in the prognosis at individual stages of the disease may be ascribed to biological differences in the degree of malignancy that may be low moderate or high. The tendency toward limited progress of the disease and successful treatment during clinical stages I and II may be due to slightly impaired local antitumor immunity in the zones of initial malignant induction. Acceleration of the disease gene ralization stemmed from totally deranged antitumor immunity. It should be assumed, in accordance with the recirculation of malignant lymphocytes, that clinical stages I and II are not isolated stages of the disease, since the diaphragm has no barrier ability and there are difficulties in differentiating between stages II and III. The modern therapeutic remedies have reached the peak of their potentialities. This prompt the necessity of the search for new, still unknown biological methods, permitting the attainment of a more complete demalignancy.