BACKGROUND The incidence of lymphoma increases enormously in patients infected with the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV). OBJECTIVE To describe the incidence, clinical and histological characteristics, treatments and survival of lymphomas associated with HTV infection. METHODS Retrospective review of medical records of patients with HIV and lymphoma, treated in a public hospital, between January 2001 and June 2009. RESULTS Twenty-two male patients were included but 14 had immunohistochemical confirmation of the lymphoma. The accumulated incidence for this period was 2.8%. The median age at lymphoma diagnosis was 39.5 years. Twelve patients (86%) had non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHI) and two (14%) Hodgkin lymphoma. The main pathological type of non-Hodgkin lymphomas was diffuse large B cell in seven cases (50%). The mean CD4 cell count and viral load were 83 cell/mm³ (33.5-113.5) and 26.000 RNA copies/ml (1210-196500), respectively Twelve patients (86%) had B type symptoms of lymphoma at the moment of diagnosis. Eleven patients (29%) received chemotherapy with or without radiotherapy, one patient (7%) received radiotherapy alone and two patients (14%) received palliative symptomatic treatment. Six cases (43%) received highly active antiretroviral therapy simultaneously with chemotherapy. Global mortality in this series was 57% (8 patients) with a median survival time of 5.8 months (2.6-26.2). CONCLUSIONS In this series of patients infected with HIV, a predominance of aggressive histological subtypes of lymphomas and low complete remission rates, were observed.