Study Design and data collection
44 DLBCL cases diagnosed as a result of lymph node biopsy in hematology department between June 2007 and September 2014 were included in the study. Patients whose treatment and polyclinic follow-ups were accepted in our department were included in the study. Pathology preparations of 13 patients for whom reactive hyperplasia was found in the lymph node biopsy and no other malignancies were taken as the control group.
The cut-off values of the laboratory parameters used in the study were chosen as the upper limit of their normal values. The term partial remission was defined as a total reduction of more than 50% of the product of the perpendicular dimensions of the measurable lesions, while the term complete remission was defined for patients who had a complete healing with no signs of disease in their post-treatment laboratory values and imaging(7).
Immunohistochemical VEGF, PDGFR, Thrombospondin stain was performed with the streptovidin-avidin-biotin method. The preparations evaluated at 40 magnification under light microscopy with a hematologist and a pathologist were scored as 0, 1, 2, 3 as per the staining ratio of the cells.