Spontaneous B-cell lymphoma in hamster

Abstract

During anatomopathologic study, including immunohistochemistry, about chagasic pancreatitis experimentally induced in four month aged male non-isogenic hamsters, weighing 107.8 ± 10.9g, lymphoma infiltration was observed in a 15 month-aged normal control animal. The neoplasia was disclosed on the occasion of necropsy studies, 330 days after the beginning of experiment. Similar lymphoma was not found in the remainder normal controls (n=73), nor in the group of infected hamsters age and weight matched (n=94). The neoplasia histopathologic and immunohistochemical changes were consistent with non-Hodgkin diffuse large B-ceIl lymphoma; nevertheless, the hypothesis of eventual leukemic origin was not entirely excluded. Experimentally induced lymphomas have been related in laboratory animais; however, cases of spontaneously occurring lymphoma have been infrequently described in hamsters. In the present case, the development of the disease could have some relation with the animal aging process.