Hodgkin's disease: unfolding concepts concerning its nature, management and prognosis

The evolution of our concepts concerning the fundamental nature and natural history of Hodgkin's disease is reviewed. Recent evidence establishes that it is indeed a malignant neoplasm, albeit a curious one, the giant cells of which display aneuploid karyotypes, often with marker chromosomes indicating their clonal derivation, and the functional and surface marker properties of cells of the mononuclear phagocyte series. The disease tends initially to spread by contiguity from one lymph node chain to others with which direct lymphatic channel communications exist. Essentially all patients, even those with limited disease, have some degree of impairment of cell-mediated immunity, apparently due to inhibition of T-lymphocyte function. Lymphangiography, computed tomography, and laparotomy with splenectomy have greatly improved the accuracy of clinical staging. Total lymphoid megavoltage radiotherapy and/or multidrug combination chemotherapy now permit the eradiction of disease of all stages, resulting in a dramatic improvement in prognosis and an increasing frequency of permanent cure of this once inevitably fatal condition.