Disseminated Visceral Lesions Associated With Extreme Eosinophilia

AMONG the conditions associated with pronounced and persistent - eosinophilia of the blood there is an obscure group of disorders reported under various names, such as chronic eosinophilia,1eosinophilia leukemoides,2extreme eosinophilia and leukocytosis,3eosinophilia and splenomegaly,4Loeffler's syndrome5and others. Many cases of so-called eosinophilic leukemia and some instances of familial eosinophilia6evidently belong in the same ill defined category. Clearcut criteria for a clinical syndrome embracing the entire group have not been established, and few pathologic studies of pertinent cases are available. The diagnosis is, therefore, often difficult. Prompted by a chance observation made in the course of an autopsy, we studied biopsy specimens of liver obtained from 3 patients with excessive eosinophilia and observed a characteristic widespread lesion which seems to us to represent the anatomic substrate of a clinical entity. We present the pathologic findings, together with clinical observations and with