Assessing survival rate of HPV-positive and HPV-negative cervical cancer patients

Abstract

Currently, studies highlighting features of emergence, development, clinical score and prognosis for patients with HPV-negative cervical cancer are scarce. However, the data regarding high recurrence rate and mortality in patients with HPV-negative head and neck cancer are demonstrated. Here, cervical canal and exocervical scraping samples collected from 116 patients with primary cervical cancer, I–IV stages, aged 24 to 79 years, were examined with real-time PCR assay for assessing prevalence of 12 high oncogenic risk human papillomavirus (HPV) strains, genotyping and viral load. It was found that 84 (72.4%) and 32 cervical cancer patients (27.6%) were positive and negative, respectively, for high oncogenic risk (HR) HPV strains. Based on these data, patients were further subdivided into two groups: HPV-positive and HPVnegative patient group. Genotyping HPV-positive samples revealed that HPV genotype 16 was found in 67.8% of cases that agrees with data published worldwide. In addition, relapse-free and overall survival (HPV-positive and HPV-negative patients) rate were also evaluated in both groups. It was demonstrated that survival rate was significantly decreased in HPVnegative cervical cancer patients additionally characterized by less favorable prognosis. Moreover, length of relapse-free survival as well as overall survival for HPV-positive vs. HPV-negative patients was 102 vs. 68 months as well as 52 vs. 83 months, respectively. On the other hand, it was demonstrated that recurrence rate, clinical score and progression of cervical cancer directly depend on cancer spread observed at primary medical examination. Of note, the majority of primary cervical cancer relapses are diagnosed within the first 2 years after completing treatment. In addition, an increasing relapse rate has been documented in cervical cancer patients at advanced stages. Upon that, biological cancer behavior remains poorly predictable even in patients at similar disease stage. Therefore, it is essential that HPV as an important prognostic factor would be taken into account for choosing proper therapeutic strategy for treatment of patients with cervical cancer.

Keywords

• cervical cancer
• human papillomavirus
• high carcinogenic risk
• viral load
• survival
• prognosis