Population-based patterns of human immunodeficiency virus-related Hodgkin lymphoma in the greater San Francisco Bay Area, 1988-1998

BACKGROUND. Epidemiologic characteristics of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)-related Hodgkin lymphoma (HL) have not been examined in the Greater San Francisco Bay Area, a center of the HIV/acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS) epidemic, for a decade, despite changes in AIDS-associated diseases after the availability of highly active antiretroviral therapies (HAART). METHODS. With population-based cancer registry data for 1988-1998, the authors examined risk factors, Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) association, incidence rates, and survival probabilities for 1752 patients with HL who were classified as HIV-positive or HIV-negative by a cancer registry-based method. RESULTS. One hundred twenty-eight patients with HL (7%) were classified with HIV/AIDS; 95% were male. Among males, multivariate analysis (n = 514 patients) found that HIV-related HL was associated strongly at diagnosis with ages 30-49 years, San Francisco residence, late-stage disease, lymphocyte depletion and unspecified histologic subtypes, and tumor cell EBV but not with other clinical features or mixed cellularity histology. Survival among patients with HIV-related HL, although it was poor, did not differ by race/ethnicity but was worse for patients with the nonnodular sclerosis histologic subtypes. Patients who were HIV-positive with HAART era (1996-1998) diagnoses were slightly older, were less likely to live in San Francisco, and were much more likely to be Hispanic compared with HIV-positive patients who were diagnosed before the HAART era; they had somewhat less aggressive disease and better survival. Incidence rates were higher for patients with HL overall compared with patients who had HIV-unrelated HL by 11% for white patients, 22% for black patients, and by 14% for Hispanic patients; excesses were greater in young adults. CONCLUSIONS. Among males in the San Francisco Bay Area, HIV-related HL had distinctive demographic features, more aggressive clinical characteristics, stronger EBV association, and poorer survival and contributed to elevated regional HL incidence rates, particularly in young adults. Patients with HIV-related HL who were diagnosed after HAART was introduced appeared to have less aggressive disease and better survival. (C) 2003 American Cancer Society.