Flow cytometry in the diagnosis of mediastinal tumors with emphasis on differentiating thymocytes from precursor T-lymphoblastic lymphoma/leukemia.

Flow cytometry (FC) has become the routine technique in the evaluation of hematopoietic neoplasms. Since the anterior mediastinum is a frequent site of involvement by both primary and secondary lymphoma/leukemia, flow cytometry plays an important role in the evaluation of mediastinal masses. The present study reviews 100 flow cytometry cases from patients presenting with mediastinal lesions.

An approach to diagnosis of T-cell lymphoproliferative disorders by flow cytometry.

T-cell lymphoproliferative disorders are among the most challenging diagnoses in hematopathology. Unlike the more common B-cell disorders, in which clonality is often readily discernible by surface immunoglobulin light chain restriction, there is no specific immunophenotypic signature that is diagnostic of a clonal T-cell population. Immunophenotypic criteria that are helpful in the diagnosis of T-cell neoplasms include T-cell subset antigen restriction, anomalous T-cell subset antigen expression, deletion or diminution of one of the pan T-cell antigens, a precursor T-cell phenotype, and expression of additional markers (e.