[Hematomorphological Differential Diagnosis of Small Cell Lymphoma. What is the Atypical Chronic Lymphadenosis?].

More importance is being attached to haematologic cell morphology, particularly in the field of small-cell non-Hodgkin lymphomas. This shifting of diagnostical validity from the structural substrate to the cellular one can clearly be illustrated by the transition of classification according to Rappoport to that according to Lennert (Kiel-classification). Here minute cytomorphological criteria acquire a new validity by their significance in the microscopic cut preparation and in the electron-microscope as well as by their correlation to cell-immunological parameters. Thus, it is possible to make a differential diagnostics of the extending small-cell lymphomas from the blood picture. It enables an ensured morphological differentiation to be made for typical B-lymphadenosis, prolymphocytic leukaemia, T-cell lymphadenosis, lymphoplasmocytoid immunocytoma, centrocytoma, and hairy cell leukaemia. The relevance of this differentiation can be further identified by a consequent immunologic cell characterization.