Granulomatous panuveitis associated with Hodgkin lymphoma: A case report with review of the literature

Background: Intraocular lymphoma (IOL) is an uncommon ophthalmic malignancy and poses a diagnostic challenge. Uveitis associated with systemic lymphoma (USL) has been predominantly attributed to non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL) and rarely reported with Hodgkin lymphoma (HL) in the literature. Methods: Case report with review of the literature. Results: A 25-year-old healthy male presented with bilateral granulomatous panuveitis including vasculitis and discrete chorioretinal yellowish-white lesions. Macular optical coherence tomography (OCT) of both eyes revealed a disruption of ellipsoid and interdigitation zones over the areas of subretinal lesions as well as a small sub-retinal pigment epithelium (RPE) deposit in one eye. Thorough uveitis workup revealed clavicular, axillary and cervical lymphadenopathy, and biopsy of lymph nodes confirmed the diagnosis of nodular lymphocyte-predominant (NLP) HL. Six months later and after receiving chemotherapy, all symptoms and most of clinical signs resolved. Conclusions: Clinical features of USL do not differ between HL and NHL. However, the age of presentation may be much younger in HL. Ocular manifestations can precede systemic HL diagnosis, as shown in our patient. Therefore, USL should be part of the differential diagnosis of panuveitis. Paraneoplastic inflammation is thought be the cause of uveitis associated with HL. The sub-RPE deposit and disruption of ellipsoid and interdigitation zones on OCT have not been documented before as a manifestation of uveitis secondary to HL. In addition, the NLP subtype of HL was reported in only 1 case with uveitis in the literature.