1. Some patients say that they visited a doctor for rhinitis or sinusitis and were surprised to find a nasal NK/T-cell lymphoma. Is this how many patients find this kind of lymphoma? A: Indeed, the symptoms of early nasal NK/T-cell lymphoma are very similar to those of rhinopharyngitis or sinusitis, such as both having symptoms such as runny nose, nasal congestion, headache and loss of sense of smell. However, with some care, subtle differences can still be found, which are related to the different pathological basis of the two. The main pathological change of rhinitis is inflammation of the mucosa of the nasal cavity, which can manifest as congestion, swelling, exudation, hyperplasia, atrophy or necrosis. In contrast, lymphoma is the formation of a swelling in the nasal cavity and can present with hemorrhage, necrosis and invasion of the swelling into the surrounding tissues. Therefore, nasal congestion in rhinitis is usually intermittent, relieved during daytime, heat, labor or exercise, and worsened at night, when sitting still or cold, and can be alternating in both nasal cavities, while nasal congestion caused by lymphoma is often fixed in one nasal cavity and continuously worsened, and intermittency is not obvious. The nasal discharge of the two may also be different. Rhinitis is often mucous or purulent and rarely accompanied by blood, while lymphoma often has blood discharge and is accompanied by nasal odor due to necrosis of the tumor. 2. Besides the symptoms of rhinitis, what are the other symptoms of this kind of lymphoma? A: As mentioned earlier, the pathological basis of lymphoma leading to symptoms is the formation of swelling in the nasal cavity, and the swelling can gradually increase in size, invade surrounding tissues or organs and spread to the whole body. Therefore, the initial symptoms are often confined to nasal congestion, runny nose, reduced sense of smell and hearing loss in one ear due to the mass in the nasal cavity. As the tumor increases in size and infiltrates, extensive damage to facial tissues and organs centered on the nose may occur, including the formation of masses in the skin around the nose, sinuses, mouth, orbit and palate. Systemic spread is common in the lymph nodes, skin, gastrointestinal tract, testes, or bone marrow. Some patients can develop high fever and even with hemophagia syndrome. 3. How malignant is nasal NK/T-cell lymphoma compared to other types of lymphoma? How long is the survival period generally if no treatment is given? A: Compared with other lymphomas, the malignancy of nasal NK/T-cell lymphoma is moderate. In general, the prognosis of early stage patients is very good, and the cure rate can reach more than 70% through the combined treatment of chemoradiotherapy. So it must be treated actively.