Splenic re-irradiation for waldenstrom's macroglobulinemia

Abstract

We report on a case of Waldenström's macroglobulinemia (WM) treated with splenic re-irradiation. To the best of our knowledge this has not been reported before. A 69-year-old Asian female patient with WM received a three-dimensional conformal radiotherapy, with 24 Gy in 12 treatment fractions in the first stage. She tolerated the treatment well, with a 37% reduction of the monoclonal immunoglobulin, an impalpable spleen, and improved hematological laboratory tests for 4 months. She was then treated with splenic re-irradiation up to 24 Gy for tumor progression. She showed no evidence of progression one year after re-irradiation, with a 55% reduction of the monoclonal immunoglobulin. Our experience demonstrates that splenic irradiation is an effective treatment to control the progression of WM. © 2012 Zhou et al.; licensee BioMed Central Ltd.