Thus, extensive pretherapeutic staging appears reasonable in order to choose the optimal form of management in patients with OAML. Of note is the fact that only one patient had bone marrow involvement at diagnosis, again Racecadotril suggesting that patients with OAML might be spared a routine bone marrow biopsy. In addition, none of our patients had central nervous system involvement during follow-up and the rate of GIinvolvement was 5% and in one additional patient, stomach involvement was detected in the course of disease, suggesting that routine GI-work up might not be necessary in patients with OAML. It has repeatedly been shown that autoimmune disorders are a common feature of both extragastric as well as gastric MALT lymphoma. In the present series, 36% of patients tested suffered from an autoimmune disorder, but this was not associated with a worse outcome or clinical course. Chronic autoimmune thyroiditis was the most frequent diagnosis documented. An association between thyroid orbitopathy and OAML development respectively was reported in a British series 2006 suspecting this condition as a predisposing factor. In the present series, however, no patient had autoantibodies or symptoms indicating Grave��s disease. Other previously discussed risk factors evaluated, e.g. elevated beta-2microglobulin, plasmacytic differentiation, exact localisation of OAML and presence of paraproteinemia also did not affect the prognosis in our cohort of patients. Ocular MALT lymphoma has repeatedly been correlated with an excellent prognosis even compared with other indolent lymphomas of the ocular adnexa e.g. follicular lymphoma. In view of the indolent behaviour of the disease along with a usually non- or oligo-symptomatic course, not only the efficacy but also Verteporfin possible side effects should be especially considered in the therapeutic decision. Local therapy with either radiation or surgery has shown excellent local control with low relapse rates although re-occurrence of the disease seemed to be more frequent in initially operated patients.