Abstract
Patients with cervical adenopathy suspicious for malignancy are often referred to the Otolaryngology Service for tissue diagnosis. Confirmation of nodal involvement by upper aero-digestive tract tumors (UADT) is best obtained by fine needle aspiration (FNA). Reported studies of FNA for lymphoma diagnosis have yielded conflicting results. Retrospective review of charts and pathology of 161 patients diagnosed with lymphomas yielded 53 patients with cervical adenopathy without apparent UADT. FNA’s were performed on 28, and were repeated nine times, for a total of 37. Eleven had Hodgkin’s disease and 17 other types of lymphomas. Seven of 37 specimens contained only blood; 15 contained lymphoid cells, nine of which were designated “reactive.” Lymphoid cells designated as “atypical” or “suspicious for lymphoma” were found in 13 of the 37 aspirates. Two were diagnostic of lymphoma. Lymphoma was confirmed by histopathologic specimens in all patients, obtained 0–941 days (median 15, mean 73 days) after initial FNA. In lymphoma patients with cervical lymphadenopathy, FNA does not usually suffice for, and often leads to significant delays in diagnosis.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Young NA, Al-Saleem TI, Ehya H, Smith MR. Utilization of fine needle aspiration cytology and flow cytometry in the diagnosis and subclassification of primary and recurrent lymphoma. Cancer Cytopathol. 1998;84:252–61.
Kocjan G. Cytological and molecular diagnosis of lymphoma. J Clin Pathol. 2005;58:561–7.
Lowe SM, Kocjan GI, Edwards SG, Miller RF. Diagnostic yield of fine-needle aspiration cytology in HIV-infected patient with lymphadenopathy in the era of HAART. Int J STD AIDS. 2008;19:553–6.
Hehn ST, Grogan TM. Miller TP utility of fine-needle aspiration as a diagnostic technique in lymphoma. J Clin Oncol. 2004;22:3046–52.
Shaw HJ. Metastatic carcinoma in cervical lymph nodes with occult primary tumour—diagnosis and treatment. J Laryngol Otol. 1970;84:249–65.
McGuirt WF, McCabe BF. Significance of node biopsy before definitive treatment of cervical metastatic carcinoma. Laryngoscope. 1978;88:594–7.
Razack MS, Sako K, Marchetta FC. Influence of initial neck node biopsy on the incidence of recurrence in the neck and survival in patients who subsequently undergo curative resectional surgery. J Surg Oncol. 1977;9:347–52.
Ellis ER, Mendenhall WM, Rao PV, McCarty PJ, Parsons JT, Stringer SP, Cassisi NJ, Million RR. Incisional or excisional neck-node biopsy before definitive radiotherapy, alone or followed by neck dissection. Head Neck. 1991;13:177–83.
Robbins KT, Cole R, Marvel J, Fields R, Wolf P, Goepfert H. The violated neck: cervical node biopsy prior to definitive treatment. Otolaryngol Head Neck Surg. 1986;94:605–10.
Bentz JS, Rowe LR, Anderson SR, Gupta PK, McGrath CM. Rapid detection of the t(11;14) translocation in mantle cell lymphoma by interphase fluorescence in situ hybridization on archival cytopathologic material. Cancer. 2004;102:124–31.
Meda BA, Buss DH, Woodruff RD, Cappellari JO, Rainer RO, Powell BL, Geisinger KR. Diagnosis and subclassification of primary and recurrent lymphoma. The usefulness and limitations of combined fine-needle aspiration cytomorphology and flow cytometry. Am J Clin Pathol. 2000;113:688–99.
Conflict of interest
None.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
About this article
Cite this article
Khillan, R., Sidhu, G., Axiotis, C. et al. Fine needle aspiration (FNA) cytology for diagnosis of cervical lymphadenopathy. Int J Hematol 95, 282–284 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12185-012-1024-y
Received:
Revised:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12185-012-1024-y