2002 Volume 14 Issue 2 Pages 121-125
Eosinophilic granuloma (EG) is a comparatively rare disease, which is more common in children than in adults. During the past 20 years, 5 cases of eosinophilic granuloma of the bone have been seen in our hospital. All were boys with an average age of 6 years (ranging from 2 to 11 years). Four patients had solitary lesions and one had multiple lesions. Among the isolated cases, two were in the pelvis and two were in the femur. In the multiple lesion cases, the primary lesion was in the femur, and the developed in lymph nodes and other bone lesions.
Curettage was performed in the cases with primary lesions and all lesions were diagnosed as EG in pathologic histology. In the cases with solitary lesions no additional treatment was performed, and all lesions healed. Chemotherapy was performed in the multiple lesion case and the progress continues to be good to date.
Many reports recommend watching the course of the disease in general in cases with solitary lesions. Therefore it is necessary to perform a proper biopsy in order to determine the histology. In multiple bone lesion cases, progressive lesion cases, and multiple lesions in other organs, chemotherapy is indicated.
EG is a disease that should be considered in differential diagnoses of osteolytic lesions in children.
