A Short Weekly Chemotherapy Regimen (Acop-B) Followed By Involved Field Radiotherapy In Limited Stage Aggressive Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma. Multicentric Analyses Of Toxicity, Efficacy And Long Term Follow Up.

Patients with Ann Arbor stages I and II diffuse large cell lymphoma (DLCL) represent a significant proportion of patients with aggressive lymphoma. Recent clinical research are developing low intensity chemotherapy approach in order to minimize short and long term side effects while maintaining high success rate. Moreover very limited studies are available on elderly patients. Since 1993 we used a brief weekly (six weeks) chemotherapy scheme (Doxorubicin, Cyclophosphamide, Bleomycin, Vincristine and Prednisone = ACOP-B) followed by involved field radiotherapy in patients with localized stage aggressive lymphoma and examined long term results and side effects in a general haematology population without age limit.