ABSTRACT
A 75-year-old woman presented to our hospital with a history of fever, cervical lymphadenopathy, and fatigue. Computed tomography(CT)revealed systemic lymphadenopathy with prominent splenomegaly. Axillary lymph node biopsy results revealed diffuse proliferation of atypical lymphoid cells with arborizing high endothelial venules. Immunohistochemical staining was positive for CD3, CD5, and CD10, but negative for CD20 and CD79a. Given these findings, a diagnosis of angioimmunoblastic T-cell lymphoma(AITL)was made. Due to the extremely high tumor burden, pre-therapy with corticosteroids was initiated. However, the patient suddenly went into hemorrhagic shock. Contrast-enhanced CT revealed abdominal bleeding due to splenic rupture. Bleeding was rapidly controlled using transcatheter arterial embolization(TAE). Five days after TAE, mini-CHOP therapy was initiated. Splenomegaly is common in hematologic disease. Owing to the lethality of the condition, in cases of progressive anemia with splenomegaly in patients with hematologic disease, the possibility of splenic rupture should be considered. Since TAE carries no risk of post-splenectomy infection and allows timely resumption of chemotherapy, it could be considered as one of the preferred treatment choices for splenic rupture in hemodynamically unstable patients.
