A manuscript in this week's issue of Blood provides important new details on potential therapeutic strategies for primary T-cell lymphoma of the gastrointestinal (GI) tract, a rare yet very aggressive disease.
In the manuscript Perry and colleagues describe 10 cases of indolent T-cell lymphoproliferative disease of the gut, associated with GI symptoms and occurring throughout the GI tract, of which all were clonal diseases as determined by gamma-chain rearrangement studies. While the course was benign with little response to therapy, investigators report 90 percent survival, calling attention to a new entity that should be recognized to avoid unnecessary aggressive therapy.