Hello, I read in a post that the type and distribution of HD seen in HIV+ patients is different from that of HIV- patients. I was hoping you could either elaborate and let me know what the differences are. I have searched on the web endlessly, and am not getting an answers.

Hodgkin's disease (HD) is indeed reasonably common in HIV-positive patients. HD is a form of lymphoma. HD is also not that uncommon in HIV-negative patients.

HD is HIV-positive patients differs from that in HIV-negative patients in several ways. 1) HD is divided into several different types according to how it looks under a microscope. One particular type, called Mixed Cellularity, is much more common in the HIV-positive patients than in the HIV-negative. 2) HD in HIV-positive patients tends to be more extensive than in HIV-negative patients. For example, the bone marrow can be involved frequently in HIV-positive patients. There are other differences in addition to these two. The treatments, however, are pretty much the same. I treat both my HIV-positive patients and my HIV-negative patients with a chemotherapy regimen called ABVD. The success rate of this treatment is pretty good in both HIV-positive and HIV-negative patients. It is very important that HIV-positive patients remain on HAART therapy during the time they are being treated for HD. Other physicians may use regimens other than the ABVD approach.