ABSTRACT
The use of the term “Richter’s syndrome” to denote the secondary development of a histologically aggressive lymphoid malignancy in a patient with preexisting chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) is relatively recent. The first use of the term is attributed to Lortholary et al. (1) in their 1964 publication, although Richter’s original description of the simultaneous occurrence of a 4‘reticulum-cell sarcoma” and CLL in a 46-year-old male shipping clerk was published 36 years earlier in 1928 (2). Since this initial descrip tion, the issue of chance occurrence versus clonal progression of the underlying CLL has been debated with only recent resolution being obtained.
