| [ Summary ] |
Although already more than 160 years have elapsed since the first report by Thomas Hodgkin, the cellular origin of neoplastic cells in Hodgkin's disease has not yet been elucidated. In contrast, the pathogenesis of non-Hodgkin's malignant lymphomas has gradually been clarified over the recent two decades, along with the accumulation of immunocytological understanding and the development of cytological differentiation antigen markers. Here, the author presents a short historical overview of the conceptual changes in malignant lymphomas until the 1960s, and then discusses major problems in the scheme of the Working Formulation, Kiel classification, and REAL classification. In addition, recent topics on low grade B-cell lymphomas which are strongly connected to MALT type lymphomas, are introduced. |