Nephrotic Syndrome and Angiotropic Lymphoma Report of a Case

Renal Intravascular Large B-cell Lymphoma: A Case Report and Review of the Literature

We herein report the case of a 52-year-old woman who consulted us because of a 2-month history of a fever, anorexia and weight loss. A physical examination was unremarkable. The blood count showed mild anemia and lymphopenia, and lactate dehydrogenase was elevated. Creatinine clearance was normal and proteinuria was undetectable. CT showed enlarged kidneys. A bone marrow biopsy was normal. PET-CT showed an intense uptake of ¹⁸fluorodeoxyglucose in both kidneys. A kidney biopsy provided the diagnosis of intravascular large B-cell lymphoma (IVLBCL). Kidney-limited IVLBCL without an impairment in the renal function or proteinuria has not been described. We analyzed the 38 published cases of IVLBCL involving the kidney to describe the main features of this entity.

Isolated renal intravascular lymphoma: a case report and review of the literature

Intravascular large B-cell lymphoma (IVLBCL) is a very rare subtype of extranodal large B-cell lymphoma. It may involve various organ systems such as skin, liver, lung or kidney. Isolated kidney involvement of IVLBCL is also very rare. Herein we report a very rare case of isolated renal IVLBCL presented with fever of unknown origin, acute kidney injury and nephrotic syndrome. Diagnosis was suspected with isolated high renal (18)F fluorodeoxyglucose uptake in positron emission tomography and confirmed with renal biopsy. Complete remission was obtained with combined chemotherapy including rituximab. We reviewed the English literature in terms of IVLBCL with renal involvement and we could only find 16 such cases. Accordingly, fever, AKI and nephritic syndrome are the most common presenting symptoms in renal intravascular lymphoma.

True identity of endocapillary proliferation: a case of intravascular large B cell lymphoma diagnosed with immunohistochemical study of kidney biopsy and literature review

A 78-year-old Japanese female presented with low-grade fever, malaise, and appetite loss lasting for 1 month. Upper and lower gastrointestinal endoscopy and contrast-enhanced whole-body computed tomography (CT) revealed no abnormal findings at a referring hospital. She was referred to our hospital because of bilateral leg edema and 2.5 g/day proteinuria. Serum creatinine was 0.73 mg/dl and the kidneys were not enlarged. Kidney biopsy showed marked endocapillary proliferation with mesangiolysis. Soon after the kidney biopsy, her symptoms improved spontaneously, along with decreases in lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) from 503 to 197 IU/l, C-reactive protein (CRP) from 4.47 to 0.66 mg/dl, and soluble interleukin-2 receptor (sIL-2R) from 1789 to 1001 U/ml. Thus, she was followed carefully as an outpatient. One month later, however, she presented with dysarthria and right-sided hemiparesis, and diffusion-weighted brain magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) showed multiple high-intensity areas. She also had respiratory failure, and lung perfusion scintigraphy showed multiple low blood stream areas. Suspecting some endovascular abnormality, we performed immunohistochemical staining of the kidney biopsy specimen taken previously to find that endocapillary infiltrating cells were CD20-positive B lymphocytes. The infiltrating cells were confined to the endocapillary compartment in glomeruli and peritubular capillaries. Both clinical and pathological findings led us to diagnose intravascular large B cell lymphoma (IVLBCL). Two bone marrow biopsies and random skin biopsies were performed, but no abnormality was found. The present case demonstrates that clinical course and renal biopsy findings of intravascular large B cell lymphoma may mimic other renal conditions and that the identification of cell types with immunohistochemical staining may help establish an accurate diagnosis.

Intravascular large B-cell lymphoma of the uterus: a case with favorable clinical outcome

Intravascular lymphoma (IVL) of the uterus, a rare manifestation of malignant lymphoma, was diagnosed in a 71-year-old woman, who had fever, edema, and genital bleeding. Only 4 cases of uterine IVL have been reported in detail in the literature in English, to the author's knowledge. The patient was treated with total hysterectomy with bilateral salpingo-oophorectomy, accompanied by subsequent chemotherapy in combination with rituximab. Preoperative endometrial cytology and biopsy showed atypical lymphocytes intermingled with nonneoplastic epithelial cells. Intravascular proliferation of atypical lymphocytes was detected by histological examination of the resected materials, in which almost the entire uterine structure, including a large endometrial polyp, ovaries, and uterine tubes were involved. Immunohistochemically, tumor cells were positive for CD20 and CD79a and negative for CD5 and CD10. In situ hybridization for Epstein-Barr virus was negative. IVL generally has a poor prognosis. However, in the present case, the patient has been disease free for at least 51 months, and a favorable outcome can be expected.

Kidney-limited intravascular large B cell lymphoma: a distinct variant of IVLBCL?

Intravascular large B cell lymphoma (IVLBCL) is a rare type of non-Hodgkin lymphoma characterized by a disseminated intravascular proliferation of tumor cells in the lumina of small vessels. Although the kidney is one of the target organs of IVLBCL, it is extremely rare that lymphoma cells are localized only in the kidney. We report here a Japanese patient with kidney-limited IVLBCL. The patient presented with mild proteinuria and a good performance status without B symptoms at presentation. A renal biopsy showed large B cell neoplastic lymphocytes in the glomerular capillary lumina. Extensive systemic examinations showed no other organ involvement. The patient responded well to rituximab and anthracycline-based chemotherapy. A follow-up renal biopsy showed the disappearance of intraglomerular lymphoma cells with restoration of glomerular architecture. Within 20 months past the discontinuation of chemotherapy, no evidence of recurrence was observed. Although IVLBCL is commonly a fatal disease, favorable clinical courses were reported in some cases of IVLBCL, such as the cutaneous variant. To our knowledge, there are 8 reported cases of kidney-limited IVLBCL in the English literature. All 4 patients treated with intensive chemotherapy responded well to the treatment as our patient. We suggest that kidney-limited IVLBCL might be a distinct variant of IVLBCL.

Intravascular B-cell lymphoma with leukemic presentation: case report and literature review

Intravascular lymphoma is an extremely rare, disseminated, and aggressive extranodal CD20+ non-Hodgkin's lymphoma characterized by the presence of lymphoma cells only in the lumina of small vessels. We report a 72-year-old woman with a diagnosis of intravascular lymphoma presented with splenomegaly and leukemic appearance in the peripheral blood smear. Her clinical course was rapidly deteriorated before the initiation of specific chemotherapy and finally died due to multiorgan insufficiency. Bone marrow biopsy revealed a characteristic infiltration of CD5, CD10 B-cell lymphoma. To our knowledge, this is the first reported case of a CD5, CD10 intravascular B-cell lymphoma with leukemic presentation in peripheral blood with multiple cytogenetic aberrations.

Intravascular lymphoma: the oncologist's "great imitator"

Intravascular lymphoma (IVL) is a rare subtype of extranodal diffuse large B-cell lymphoma with a distinct presentation. Anatomically the disease is characterized by the proliferation of clonal lymphocytes within small vessels with relative sparing of the surrounding tissue. The clinical symptoms of the disease are dependent on the specific organ involvement, which most often includes the central nervous system and skin. Because of the various modes of presentation and the rarity of IVL, the diagnosis is often made postmortem. The diagnosis is almost exclusively made by surgical biopsy of a suspected site of involvement. Advances in imaging and immunohistochemistry have led to increasing antemortem diagnosis of this lymphoma. Although some patients with this disease may be curable with aggressive therapy, further research into novel treatment strategies is needed to improve outcome. Some potential insights into future therapies may be drawn from the small amount of basic science literature relevant to this entity. This review provides a concise, up-to-date summary of IVL.