Maintenance therapy with recombinant interferon alpha-2B (αIFN) in prognostically unfavourable aggressive non-Hodgkin's lymphomas (NHL)

Fifteen patients from a series of 37 consecutive patients with aggressive NHL who achieved a complete remission (CR) with first line chemotherapy were defined at high or high-intermediate risk of relapse according to International Prognostic Risk Index and were treated with αIFN as maintenance therapy for two years. After a median follow-up of 62 months only 3/15 patients (20%) relapsed and 2/15 (13.3%) died in the αIFN treated group, favourably comparing with the expected relapse and death rate in that setting; on the other hand 40.9% of 'low risk' patients from the same series, who did not receive αIFN, had relapsed. αIFN maintenance therapy appears to result in prolonged response duration and survival in patients with aggressive and prognostically unfavourable NHL.