The initials ESR stand for erythrocyte sedimentation rate. This is a simple blood test which is a measure of the thickness of the blood. In recent years in many hospital laboratories it has been replaced by another blood tests which measures 'plasma viscosity'. Basically the plasma viscosity test and the ESR are measuring the same thing and give the same information.

A raised, or abnormal, figure for the ESR can occur in many different medical conditions.

The ESR can be abnormal if a cancer is active and is very often raised if a lymphoma is present. So keeping an eye on your ESR is one way of checking that the lymphoma has not come back.

But the ESR can also be raised during infections or with inflammatory illnesses (like many types of arthritis) and in many other situations. So a raised ESR on its own is not a sign of cancer but if your test did become abnormal it would be a warning to your specialists to run some other checks just to make sure that the result was not due to a return of your lymphoma.