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Treatment for Hodgkin's lymphoma depends on the type and location of cancer throughout the body. Patients with newly diagnosed Hodgkin's lymphoma and recurrent Hodgkin's lymphoma are treated using very different approaches.
Newly diagnosed Hodgkin's lymphoma is usually treated using a combination of chemotherapy and radiotherapy. In general, the chemotherapy is given in the outpatient clinic and lasts from four to six months. Current chemotherapy treatments for Hodgkin's have many fewer long-term side effects than those used in the past. Radiation is generally given after all the chemotherapy has been completed. Research studies are on-going to determine if and when it may be safe to omit radiation.
Patients with recurrent, also called relapsed, Hodgkin's lymphoma usually will receive intensive chemotherapy tailored to result in maximal shrinkage of the Hodgkin's. This usually requires at least several months. This will be consolidated with high-dose chemotherapy with stem cell transplantation support. Radiation may be given afterwards.
Stem cell transplantation is a complex treatment involving hematopoietic stem cells, the specific type of cell from which all blood cells develop. Transplantation of normal stem cells from another person may help restore normal blood production in children whose own ability to make any or all of these blood cells has been compromised by cancer, intensive cancer treatment, or other types of damage or abnormality.
Your primary oncologist will speak with you in detail about stem cell transplantation if it becomes a treatment option.
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