Evidence for polyclonal infection of Epstein-Barr virus in a patient with primary cutaneous anaplastic large cell lymphoma.

We report a case of CD30 + primary cutaneous anaplastic large cell lymphoma. The lymphoma cells were shown to express the Epstein-Barr virus (EBV)-encoded small RNAs by in situ hybridization and to have EBV genomes by PCR, whereas no monoclonal band was detected by Southern blot analysis using the EBV terminal repeat probe. These data suggested polyclonal infection by EBV, which provides evidence that EBV plays little part in the pathogenesis of this tumour even in the infected cases.