A 21-year-old man who developed heavy proteinuria 8 years after remission of Hodgkin's disease treated with MOPP chemotherapy and radiation therapy is reported. Evidence of Hodgkin's disease could not be documented, and minimal changes were revealed by renal biopsy. Proteinuria persisted for 20 months and was followed by dysuria and the discovery of an inflammatory polyp of the bladder. The proteinuria decreased 1 month after excision of the polyp, and disappeared during the following year. Rather than indicating relapse of lymphoma, proteinuria in this patient resulted from a lesion not previously associated with Hodgkin's disease, but possibly resulting from long-term effects of therapy.
Cancer 54:777-779, 1984.
LTHOUGH FEWER THAN 1% of patients with Hodg-A kin's disease develop nephrotic syndrome,'.* an association of the two conditions has been recognized for many years.3 The etiology of nephrotic syndrome in earlier reports was primarily amyloidosis, which developed after years of active Hodglun's disease, and probably resulted from lack of effective treatment of the neoplasm! Most cases of'nephrotic syndrome in patients with Hodgkin's disease described over the last 20 years have had lipoid nephrosis, membranous nephropathy, or proliferative nephritis, and renal disease developed within months of diagnosis of Hodgkin's disease in the m a j ~r i t y . ~ In view of the close temporal association of nephrotic syndrome with presentation or relapse of Hodgkin's disease,' it has been suggested that the urine protein excretion be monitored in patients with malignancie~.~
We report a patient who developed heavy proteinuria 8 years after diagnosis and successful treatment of Hodgkin's disease, and in whom no evidence of recurrent disease could be found. Proteinuria resolved after removal of an inflammatory polyp from the bladder.