The clinical course of 49 patients with the diagnosis of non-Hodgkin's lymphoma were studied in the Department of Otolaryngology of the Hospital General de Mexico between December 1986 and March 1997. The most frequent clinical symptoms in these patients were: nasal obstruction, rhinorrhea, fever, weight loss, cervical lymph adenopathy, rhinopharyngeal tumor, ulceration on the palate and periorbital cellulitis. In 73% of the patients in this series the primary presentation was nasal. Sixty-six percent of the patients were classified as intermediate grade lymphoma according to the New Working Formulation, and 33% were in a I B state according to the Ann Arbor predominant immunotype was B cell in 63% of the cases. An extensive review of the literature is also presented.