Advances in the treatment of Hodgkin's lymphoma

Given the successful treatment for most patients with Hodgkin's lymphoma, e fforts have been directed primarily toward improving outcomes for the minor ity of patients with poor prognosis or relapsed disease or reducing the lat e effects of therapy for long-term survivors. Recently, a simple and clinic ally useful prognostic scoring system was developed for patients with advan ced disease. This system allows better risk assessment for individual patie nts and more uniformity among patients participating in clinical trials. In addition, trials using newer chemotherapeutic regimens such as Stanford V or BEACOPP (bleomycin, etoposide, doxorubicin, cyclophosphamide, vincristin e, procarbazine, prednisone) are maturing with promising results, Other stu dies are helping to define the role of high-dose therapy for patients with Hodgkin's lymphoma, although biologic treatments such as cellular or antibo dy-based therapies are still in early phases of development. Lastly, positr on emission tomographic scanning is emerging as a useful tool in staging an d following Hodgkin's lymphoma. (C) 2000 Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, Inc .