Clinical Characteristics and Outcomes of Newly Diagnosed Patients with HIV-Associated Aggressive B-Cell NHL in China

Background: Little is known about the incidence, clinicopathologic characteristics, prognostic factors, and survival of lymphoma in people with HIV as these are less common than HIV-negative lymphoma, and currently, there are no standard guidelines for treatment of these patients.

Methods: We performed a study to analyze the clinical characteristics and outcomes of newly diagnosed HIV-associated aggressive B-cell non-Hodgkin's lymphoma (NHL) patients in CUCH, as the largest HIV-associated lymphoma cohort in China so far.

Results: Totally 86 newly diagnosed HIV-associated aggressive B-cell NHL patients in CUCH, southwest China, from July 2008 to August 2021, were analyzed. In the the entire cohort, median age was 48 years (range, 23-87 years), and more patients were male (87.2%). Most patients had elevated lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) (82.6%), advanced ann arbor stage (80.2%) and high IPI score (IPI score, 3-5) (62.7%) at diagnosis. Median CD4+ T cell count at diagnosis was 191/μl (range, 4-1022), 84 patients (97.7%) were on combination antiretroviral therapy (cART) at lymphoma diagnosis. With a median follow-up of 44.5 months (range, 2-160 months), median OS in the no received anti-lymphoma chemotherapy, only received one or two cycles and more than two cycles groups were 4 months, 9 months, and not reached, respectively (p=0.002). Cox multivariate analysis showed that age ≥60 (HR=3.162, 95%CI 1.500-6.665; p=0.002) and received less than two cycles of chemotherapy (HR=0.524, 95%CI 0.347-0.791; p=0.002) were independent risk factor for adverse prognosis based on OS.

Conclusion: Overall, these data indicated that standardized anti-lymphoma therapy and rituximab administration were significantly associated with improved outcomes.

No relevant conflicts of interest to declare.