Mycosis fungoides and Sézary syndrome in Japan. Clinicopathologic study of 107 autopsy cases.

We reviewed 111 clinical and pathological materials of patients who had been entered as mycosis fungoides (MF) or Sézary syndrome (SS) in the Annuals of the Pathological Autopsy Cases in Japan during the 29-year-period since the Annuals' inception in 1958. One hundred and seven patients were classified. Of these, 64 were in Group 1 (mycosis fungoides, MF), 23 in Group II (Sézary syndrome, SS), and 20 in Group III (non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, NHL). The clinicopathologic features of Groups I and II (MF, SS) were similar to those of cutaneous T cell lymphoma (CTCL) in Europe and the United States. Those of Group III (NHL) were indistinguishable from primary cutaneous non-Hodgkin's lymphoma. It was suggested that some patients with adult T cell leukemia/lymphoma (ATLL) with skin lesions used to be misdiagnosed as MF or SS in earlier years when ATLL was still unknown. It was concluded that CTCL in Japan has clinicopathologic features quite like those of CTCL in Europe and the United States and that they are probably the same disease.