title: Castleman's disease: systematic analysis of 416 patients from the literature.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Castleman's disease is a rare primary disease of the lymph nodes with limited available clinical information.
  
  
  METHODS
  A systematic literature search identified 416 cases amenable to detailed analysis.
  
  
  RESULTS
  In HIV(-) patients, centricity, pathology type, the presence of symptoms, gender, and age all predict outcome in univariate analyses. The 3-year disease-free survival (DFS) rate for patients with unicentric hyaline vascular disease (49.5% of cases, class I) was 92.5%, versus 45.7% for those with multicentric plasma cell disease (20.2% of cases, class III) and 78.0% for those with any other combination (22.6% of cases, class II) (p < .0001). HIV(+) patients (class IV) exclusively presented with multicentric plasma cell disease and had a 3-year DFS rate of only 27.8%. Kaposi's sarcoma and lymphoma were observed in 59.3% and 9.4% of HIV(+) patients and in 2.6% and 3.6% of HIV(-) patients (p < .0001). Paraneoplastic pemphigus and the syndrome of polyneuropathy, organomegaly, endocrinopathy, monoclonal gammopathy, and skin changes were observed exclusively in HIV(-) patients at a rate of 1.3% and 1.8%, respectively.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Clinical, pathological, and viral markers allow for the classification of Castleman's disease into groups with markedly different outcomes and disease associations.
authors.affiliation: F.R.C.S., Department of Endocrine Surgery, King's College Hospital, King's Health Partners, Denmark Hill, London, SE5 9RS, UK.
authors.forename: Nadia
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Talat
authors.forename: Klaus-Martin
authors.initials: KM
authors.lastname: Schulte
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D005871:Castleman Disease / Q000145:classification* / Q000473:pathology / Q000821:virology; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged