Sunday Poster Session
Category: Colon

Gnanashree Dharmarpandi, MD
HCA Florida Healthcare Citrus Memorial hospital
Inverness, FL
Non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL) in the colon is a rare malignancy, accounting for 0.2-1.2% of all primary colon cancers and a minority of gastrointestinal lymphomas. The most common subtype is diffuse large B-cell lymphoma, but other subtypes such as marginal zone lymphoma of mucosa-associated lymphoid tissue, follicular lymphoma, and mantle cell lymphoma can also occur. Here we present a rare case of colon mass found to be recurrent B-cell non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma suggestive of extranodal marginal zone lymphoma.
NHL of the colon may cause diarrhea due to direct infiltration and disruption of the colonic mucosa by malignant lymphoid cells which can lead to mucosal ulceration, impaired absorption, and local inflammation. Additionally, the lymphoma may mimic inflammatory bowel disease by presenting with diarrhea, abdominal pain, and weight loss. Fecal calprotectin may be elevated due to mucosal inflammation leading to activation of neutrophils and migration into intestinal lumen. First-line treatment is systemic chemotherapy. Prognosis varies by histology and stage, but 5-year overall survival rates can exceed 70% for localized disease. There is a lack of standardized protocols for treatment and further research should be done to characterize this condition and optimize treatment strategies.
