Percentage of {Gamma}{Delta} T Cells in Panniculitis by Paraffin Immunohistochemical Analysis.

Publication/Presentation Date

6-1-2009

Abstract

Cutaneous T-cell lymphomas with panniculitis-like histologic features have different clinical courses depending on whether they are composed of alphabeta T cells or gammadelta T cells, necessitating their distinction for proper prognostication. However, unlike alphabeta T cells, gammadelta T cells cannot be reliably detected in formalin-fixed, paraffin-embedded sections. We demonstrated that a commercially available antibody can detect gammadelta T cells and examined 2 cases of flow cytometry-proven gammadelta T-cell lymphomas and 15 control cases of nonneoplastic panniculitis. In both lymphomas, the atypical lymphocytes were gammadelta T cells, whereas the reactive lymphocytes were alphabeta T cells. In contrast, nonneoplastic panniculitis had predominantly alphabeta T cells with many fewer and individually scattered gammadelta T cells. The detection of gammadelta T cells in paraffin sections provides a powerful new tool to characterize T cells in lymphomas and inflammation.

Volume

131

Issue

6

First Page

820

Last Page

826

ISSN

1943-7722

Disciplines

Medical Pathology | Pathology

PubMedID

19461088

Department(s)

Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, Pathology Laboratory Medicine Faculty

Document Type

Article

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