The Relationship Between Non-Hodgkin's Lymphoma And Epstain-Barr Virus Infection In Guangzhou

Objective Epstein-Barr virus(EBV) is a lymphocryptovirus, the only member of the herpesvirus family which can infect the human being.lt is associated with the development of some tumors. Recently, there has been concerned the association of EBV with non-Hodgkin lymphoma(NHL), but lack of comprehensive reports. Southern China(Guangzhou), a high-incidence area of NPC,which is closely associated with EBV infection.How about the relationship betweejn EBV infection and the differentimmunophenotype of NHLs? what difference among the test methods? The purpose of this study is to solve these problems by using enough specimens.Methods (l)Immunohistochemistry(IH) for T- and B-cell markers, com-bining HE staining was performed for dignosing B-cell lymphoma(B-NHL) or T-cell lymphoma (T- NHL) in 206 cases of NHLs occurring in Guangzhou. (2)The latent membrane protein 1 (LMP1) was detected by IH.(3) In situ hybridization(ISH) was done for detecting the EBV-encoded small RNA1 (EBER1) using a special probe. (4) pBV-BamHIW and EBV-BNLF1 fragments are amplified by polymerase chain reaction(PCR) using two pairs of primes. The data were processed by SPSS10.0 program hi order to indicate the relationship between NHL and EBV infection.Result (1 )Of the 206 cases of NHLs studied, 156 of them were B-NHLs (75.7%),50 cases were T-NHLs (24.3%) .The ratio of B :T was 3:1. 52.4 perscent of NHLs was in lymph node. (2) The positivity of EBV-LMP1 in NHLs was 20.0%,including 15.4% in B-NHLs and 34% in T-NHLs .Theresults showed a statistically significant in B-NHLs and T-NHLs (P= 0.004). (3)The positivity of EBER1 by ISH was 32.7% in B-NHLs ,and 60% in T-NHLs.There was a statistically significant (P=0.001). (4)The w-fragment of EBV-DNA by PCR was detected in 94 cases of NHLs(45.6%),and 5 cases of benign lymphoproliferate tissues.There was a statistically significant (P= 0.028) . (5)The positivity of EBV-BNLF1 gene was 28.6% which was less than that of EBV-BamHIW. We also found that the positivity of EBER1 by ISH and EBV-BamHIW by PCR was close to each other ( P=0.085 ) .Conclusion From above study, the following conclusions can be drawn: (1) B-NHL is the main immunophenotype of NHL in Guangzhou.(2)The data suggest that there is a high EBV infection in NHLs especially, in extranodal T-NHLs by IH and ISH and PCR. It suggests that EBV may be closely associated with the pathogenesis of extranodal T-NHLs.(3)There are many ways for studying the relationship between NHL and EBV infection. ISH for EBER1 and PCR for EBV-BamHIW are sensitive methods.