Francisco J. Hernandez-ilizaliturri, MD

The addition of rituximab (Rituxan) to systemic chemotherapy has improved the response rates, progression-free survival, and overall survival of patients with newly diagnosed diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL) compared to chemotherapy alone. In the front-line setting, the use of rituximab is changing the biology and clinical behavior in DLBCL patients who fail to respond or relapse following chemoimmunotherapy.

According to published statistics, in 2008 approximately 66,120 new cases of non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL) were diagnosed and 19,160 lymphoma patients died from their disease despite currently available treatment.[1] Diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL), the most common type of B-cell NHL, has an aggressive clinical course and, as demonstrated by gene-profiling studies, can be further divided into subgroups with distinct biologic characteristics and prognoses.[2]