Silicone lymphadenopathy mimicking a lymphoma in a patient with a metatarsophalangeal joint prosthesis

With lymph node enlargement, the possibility of a malignant process such as metastatic carcinoma or lymphoma needs to be excluded. This report describ es a 47 year old woman with inguinal lymph node enlargement initially suspi cious for lymphoma. Fine needle aspiration findings favoured reactive hyper plasia, but a malignant process could not be excluded. The final histologic al diagnosis was a foreign body granulomatous inflammatory response as a re sult of regionally disseminated silicone particles from an over looked meta tarsophalangeal joint prosthesis. Because of the large number of joint pros theses world wide, it should be kept in mind that migration of wear particl es can create granulomatous inflammation and node enlargement.