What is the difference between lymphomas and leukemias?
In general, leukemias involve mostly the blood and the bone marrow. Lymphomas are much more likely to involve lymph nodes, other organs, and sometimes also the bone marrow. Are there specific risk factors? The risk factors for lymphomas are a number of other diseases that affect the immune system. Patients who have immune suppression — because they have had transplants, autoimmune diseases (like rheumatoid arthritis, lupus), or HIV infection — are at an increased risk of getting lymphoma. What are the signs and symptoms of NHL? Do they differ from the symptoms of other blood cancers? For the low-grade lymphomas, symptoms usually just involve finding some enlarged lymph nodes. Patients who have aggressive lymphomas usually feel very bad. They often have fatigue, weight loss, fevers, night sweats, and a variety of other problems. Local symptoms depend on which parts of the body the lymphoma involves. How is NHL diagnosed? The diagnosis is based on a biopsy of some kind, and diagnosing
