Unicentric Castleman Disease

Speakers: Eric Oksenhendler

Eric Oksenhendler is Professor of Clinical Immunology and Head of the Department of Clinical Immunology in Hôpital Saint-Louis (French National Reference Center for Castleman Disease since 2017) and Université Paris-Diderot in Paris. He is involved in Castleman disease (CD) Clinical care and Science since the 90ies. In 2012, he joined the Castleman Disease Collaborative Network (CDCN) and became a Scientific Advisory Board member mainly involved in Clinical care. Prof Oksenhendler was involved in the initiation of a French national registry for all types of CD (> 560 patients / December 2021).

The initial focus of his research was the patients with CD in the context of HIV infection. In which area has published several manuscripts: The first series of HIV-associated MCD, Discovery of HHV-8 as the infectious agent responsible for this peculiar MCD, Description of the high risk of lymphoma in this population, Efficacy of Rituximab in HHV-8 associated MCD, Description of HHV-8 MCD in the general HIV-non infected population and Overview of UCD.

Nowadays his current research fields are UCD (Involvement of stroma cells), iMCD (Involvement of the Tfh cells) and HHV-8 associated MCD (Characterization of the infected cells).