ORAL PSEUDOLYMPHOMA - A REPORT OF 2 CASES

Although 2% to 10% of lymphomas present first in the oral cavity and l ymphomas are the third most common oral malignancy, pseudolymphoma is a very infrequent problem within oral pathology. Two cases of oral pse udolymphoma are presented. Both were old persons with an infiltrative lesion on the oral mucosa that histologically showed a dense polymorph ous infiltrate with some nuclear atypia that raised the problem of lym phoma versus pseudolymphoma. Both lesions disappeared with no relapse after 2-years' follow-up. Histologically, case 1 was mainly a lymphohi stiocytic infiltrate whose histiocytic component showed nuclear featur es that mimicked Hodgkin's cells. In case 2, the infiltrate was mainly composed of histiocytes and eosinophils. The suspicion of malignancy here was a consequence of a high mitotic rate of histiocytes and of th e large hyperchromatic nuclei of the intraepithelial lymphocytes. Simi larities and differences with other pseudomalignant (lymphomatoid papu losis and atypical histiocytic granuloma) and inflammatory (traumatic ulcerative granuloma with stromal eosinophilia) disorders, as well as with some histiocytoses, are discussed. In the absence of a wider expe rience on this subject, an objective description of new cases seems ap propriate. (C) Munksgaard 1997.