Clinical and prognostic analysis of 78 patients with human immuno-deficiency virus associated non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma in Chinese population

BACKGROUND: Human Immuno-deficiency Virus (HIV) associated non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma (NHL) was a special group of disease, which manifests distinct clinical features and prognosis as compared with NHLs in patients without HIV. We performed this study to describe the clinical features of the disease and investigated the potential prognostic factors. METHODS: HIV-infected patients who were newly diagnosed with NHL were enrolled in this study. The selection of anti-lymphoma treatment regimen was mainly dependent on the pathological subtypes of NHLs. Tumor response was reviewed and classified according to the International Workshop Criteria. RESULTS: A total of 78 patients were enrolled, among whom, 42 (53.8%) were with Diffuse large B cell Lymphoma (DLBCL), and 29 (37.2%) were with Burkitt lymphoma (BL). BL patients presented with higher risk features as compared with DLBCL in terms of numbers of extranodal diseases (P = 0.004) and poor Eastern cooperative oncology group (ECOG) score (P = 0.038). The estimated 2-year overall survival (OS) and progression free survival (PFS) rate was 74.3 ± 8.1%, 28.9 ± 11.0%, and 54.2 ± 8.1%, 19.2 ± 7.5% for DLBCL and BL, respectively. In multivariate analysis, international prognostic index (IPI) score was an independent prognostic factor for predicting both OS (OR = 2.172, 95% CI 1.579–2.987, P < 0.001) and PFS (OR = 1.838, 95% CI 1.406–2.402, P < 0.001). CONCLUSIONS: HIV associated NHLs represents a group of heterogeneous aggressive diseases with poor prognosis. IPI parameters were still effective in predicting the prognosis of HIV associated NHLs. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s13027-017-0120-2) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.