Burkitt Lymphoma:

Burkitt Lymphoma is a type of cancer or tumor which occurs in lymphatic system. To be specific, it occurs in B.Lymphocytes. It is also referred to as Burkitt’s type, Burkitt’s Tumor or Malignant Lymphoma. It was first discovered by a surgeon named Denis Parsons Burkitt in the year 1956.

 Types of Burkitt Lymphoma

Based on the clinical events, they are divided in to three main types. It can be either endemic, sporadic and/ or can be found associated with immunodeficiency diseases like AIDS or HIV.  Almost 90% of AIDS patients show the symptoms of Burkitt Lymphoma.

• Endemic Burkitt Lymphoma: It is prevalent in equatorial Africa. It occurs mostly in children. It is characterized by malignancy in facial bone, jaw, breast, kidney, ovary, cecum and distal ileum. This induces the chronic malaria occurrence and also resist Epstein Barr virus.
• Sporadic Burkitt lymphoma: This is an alternative form of non-Hodgkin Lymphoma and its occurrence is prevalent outside Africa. The sporadic cancerous cells look like endemic cancerous cells by providing damaging immunity in such a way Epstein Barr Virus invades. About 30% to 50% of lymphoma that occurs in children is sporadic Burkitt lymphoma. It occurs in ileo cecal region and not much in jaw.
• Immunodeficiency type: This type of lymphoma is found prevalent in HIV or AIDS patients.

It is not so easy to differentiate between the three different types of clinical variants based on morphology. Immunodeficiency is with plasmalytic appearance and is not much specific in appearance.

Genetics of Burkitt lymphoma

The chromosomal translocation of specific c myc gene results in the formation of Burkitt lymphoma. Gene is found to be 8q24.

Appearance

They appear as monotonous sheets which are similar in morphology and size.  Their proliferation rate and apoptotic rate is very high.  They are medium sized cells. They are seen as starry sky with macrophages under very low power. They consist of basophilic cytoplasm. Square shaped cell outline is prevalently found when viewed under microscope. Both B lymphocytes and Burkitt lymphoma consist of proliferative IgH genes. The smear is formed when DNA of tumor cells are analyzed by electrophoresis techniques.

Treatment of Burkitt lymphoma

Cancerous cells can be treated by chemotherapy and it is entirely dependent on the diagnosis period. When proliferation of cancer cells are more, it is easily treated rather than slowly growing cells. Faster growing cancerous cells can form a disease called Tumor Lysis Syndrome. Adequate hydration is essential to treat the cancerous cells. The other treatments for Burkitt lymphoma are immunotherapy, radiotherapy and transplantation of bone marrow cells and tumor cells by surgery.