Rituximab plus a CHOP-like regimen, central nervous system prophylaxis, and contralateral testicular irradiation for localized primary testicular diffuse large B-cell lymphoma lead to prolonged progression-free survival.

Abstract

We retrospectively evaluated the clinical features, management, and survival of 12 patients (age 51-84years) with localized primary testicular diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (PTL). All 12 PTL patients underwent orchiectomy. Seven of the 12 patients were treated with strategy A, which consisted of at least six cycles of rituximab (R) plus a CHOP-like regimen, central nervous system (CNS) prophylaxis involving intrathecal chemotherapy (IT) and/or high-dose intravenous methotrexate, and contralateral scrotal irradiation (cRT). The other five patients were treated with strategy B, which included three regimens: orchiectomy alone, orchiectomy plus cRT and IT, and orchiectomy plus 3-4 cycles of R-CHOP plus cRT with or without IT. The median follow-up period was 48months (range 19-123months). The 4-year progression-free survival (PFS) rate for the seven patients treated with strategy A was 85.7%, whereas that for the five patients treated with strategy B was 20%. The patients treated with strategy A exhibited a significantly higher 4-year PFS rate than those treated with strategy B (P=0.017). These results confirmed that the administration of a sufficient number of cycles of an R-containing chemotherapy regimen plus cRT plus CNS prophylaxis should be considered as a treatment for localized PTL.