ABSTRACT
Origins of modern concepts of lymphoid neoplasia 23 Hodgkin disease, leukemia and pseudoleukemia 24 Lymphosarcoma versus hyperplasia 25 Emergence of histologic classification 26 Histologic perspectives on Hodgkin disease and 27
lymphosarcoma Entities new and old 28 The reticuloendothelial system 29 Reticulum cell sarcoma 30 Evolution of histologic classification schemes 32 Clinicopathologic correlations 34 Blind alleys 34
The importance of follicular lymphoma 35 Hodgkin’s disease 35 Leukemia 36 The immunobiologic revolution 36 Lymphocyte differentiation pathways and lymphoid 37
neoplasia The last purely histologic classification and the 38
beginning of international consensus Beyond the cell: cytogenetics and molecular genetics 38 Present and future 40 Key points 40 References 41
Modern pathology has its foundations in the understanding of the structure of the human body that emerged in the Renaissance era, along with many other scientific and artistic advances. Vesalius’ great book, De Humani Corporis Fabrica, published in seven volumes in 1543 and beautifully illustrated by a student of the Venetian painter, Titian, established the importance of dissection of the human body to an understanding of human anatomy. Over 100 years later, Thomas Bartholin (1616-80) and Olaus Rudbeck (1630-1702) almost simultaneously discovered the lymphatic system – or rather, the connection, via the thoracic duct, between lymph vessels draining the intestine and the bloodstream. The role of the lymphatic system in immunity, however, was to remain unknown for centuries. Similarly, there could be no understanding of human disease until the emergence of modern pathology in the course of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, when it became evident that diseases could be understood through an examination of their effects on the body – a
the time of Hippocrates, to the theory that disease results from an imbalance in ‘vital forces’ or humors.
