Background & objective: Hodgkin and Reed-Sternberg (HRS) cells of classical Hodgkin's Lymphoma (CHL) express B-cell marker CD20 with a reported frequency of 5%-58%. The prognostic significance of CD20 expression in HRS cells of CHL is still controversial. This study was to investigate the prognostic significance of CD20 expression in naive CHL patients.
Methods: The expression of CD20, CD15 and CD30 in 70 specimens of CHL were detected by immunohistochemistry; tumor morphology was observed with HE staining. A sample with CD20 expression on more than 10% of HRS cells was considered CD20-positive. The failure-free survival (FFS) and overall survival (OS) rates were compared by log-rank test. Cox proportional hazard model was used in multivariate analysis.
Results: Of the 70 cases of CHL, 21 (30.0%) were CD20-positive, 26 (37.1%) were CD15-positive, and all were CD30-positive. The positive rate of CD20 was significantly higher in the patients aged > or =45 years than in those aged <45 years (53.3% vs. 23.6%, P=0.026). The patients were followed up for a median of 58.3 months. The 5-year FFS rates were 76.2% in CD20-positive patients and 77.6% in CD20-negative patients (P=0.484). The 5-year OS rates were 80.4% in CD20-positive patients and 92.5% in CD20-negative patients (P=0.006). Cox multivariate analysis showed that age and stage were independent prognostic factors for FFS and OS.
Conclusions: The positive rate of CD20 is relatively low in HRS cells of CHL. It is higher in the patients aged > or =45 years than in those aged <45 years. However, according to our results, the expression of CD20 is not an independent prognostic factor for FFS and OS of naive CHL patients.