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Eight months ago, my 23 year old found a large

Sent to Health Experts May 19 02:26 PM

Eight months ago, my 23 year old found a large cervical lymph node biopsy number 1 shows follicular and paracortical hyperplasis, Node becomes extremely hard 2nd biospy is done shows follicular and paracortial hyperplasis with a moderate increase in immunoblasts-lymph node was removed. Presents with another larger node within three weeks of removal. PET results are highly suspicious of malignacy. Dr says could be from high IgE levels-hay fever. Is it posible it could hay fever? Want should we do next?

 

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Female , Age: 23

Already Tried:
antibiotics biospies

Customer (name blocked for privacy)
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May 19 5:07 PM (54 minutes and 43 seconds later)
         
Reply to Jon Fay's Post: Becky occasionally has some stuffiness and runny nose nothing that ever required medication. There are no symptoms other than the same side of the face is slightly swollen. There are 4 or 5 nodes that show some reaction to the radioactive glucose, all in the same area,submandibular and along the carotid sheath. The largest node,measures about one inch and has a suv of 18.3, another 5.6 and the others 2.0 and less. All of the enlarged nodes were noted at the last biospy and removal on March 7. No dental problems can be found. He reccommended doing another biospy in June. No EBV was found, she takes no medications. He did not mention any of the syndromes you did. There were no other parts of her body that indicated glucose uptake. Thank you so much for your help!
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May 19 6:08 PM (1 hour and 1 minute later)
         
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O.K., thank you for the additional information; sorry that I misidentified your daughter as a young man. In any event, we're clear now.

I am starting to better understand the events that have preceeded your question. Your daughter has had painless lymph node swelling ("lymphadenopathy" - and they were painless?) over 8 months, a few biopies, a troubling PET scan result, and pathology reports that have not been conclusive for lymphoma or other cancer. Nevertheless, removal of the nodes occured on 3/7, and still there is no confirmation of lymphoma, etc. She tested negative for EBV, And it appears that now, from your reports, that one of the working hypotheses is that this is all due to hay fever.

You must both be tremendously frustrate and frightened. To have a potential diagnosis of cancer, followed by surgery on your young daughter is a horrific scenario that I would wish on no one. Furthermore, you must be frustrated that after all of that, a conclusive diagnosis has not been reached either way.

From my point of view, which admittedly is hindered because I do not have access to all of her records, nor am I an oncologist or pathologist, I think you should feel reassured. The fact that with the extensive biopsies and pathology reports they have been unable to confirm a diagnosis of cancer of any kind is very reassuring, I think. Lymphoma, Hodgkin's and otherwise, and leukemias are in most instances diagnosed by substantial pathological evidence and laboratory data, none of which is apparently present in your daughter's case. I think that is reassuring.

Another biopsy next month, if that is what is planned, is prudent and it will hopefully also not show conclusive evidence of any sort of cancer. Her physician appears to be "watching and waiting." You have not, up to this point, mentioned any other symptoms, as well, that are often common in patients with lymphoma or other forms of cancer. So I find this reassuring as well.

I did not suspect Job's syndrome, or hyper IgE syndrome, but since you mentioned elevated IgE I just wanted to clarify that it was not mentioned.

It sounds like you have things well in hand, and a team of physicians are working on her case. If you haven't received a second opinion yet, then I would do so. Perhaps a third as well. In a case like this, without any easy answers, I think that the more people working on it the better. Inquire again of a pathologist, and perhaps an oncologist, what they might think from what they have seen. Hopefully, someone soon will come up with a concrete answer.

I hope this helps. I wish I could provide you with a better answer to this, a final answer. But I think that you should be reassured that, with all of their attempts so far, a diagnosis of cancer has not been able to be made. This, I think, is good news.

Please let me know if you have any further questions. Take care.


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