COMPARISON OF DETECTION OF HUMAN PAPILLOMAVIRUS-16 DNA IN CERVICAL-CARCINOMA TISSUES BY SOUTHERN BLOT HYBRIDIZATION AND NESTED POLYMERASE CHAIN-REACTION

An association between human papillomavirus (HPV) and cervical neoplas ia has been widely reported and HPV DNA is commonly detected in cervic al carcinoma tissues. However, estimates of the prevalence of HPV infe ction differs among various detection methods. Seventy cases of cervic al carcinoma were screened for HPV 16 infection by Southern blot hybri disation (SBH) and nested polymerase chain reaction (PCR). According t o SBH, the prevalences of HPV 16 DNA in stage I (n = 40) and stage II (n = 30) cervical carcinomas were 52.5 and 63.3%, respectively, and th e overall prevalence was 57.1% (40 of 70). By nested PCR, the prevalen ces of HPV 16 infection in stage I and II cervical carcinomas were 87. 5 and 93.3%, respectively, and the overall prevalence was 90.3%. The p revalence of HPV DNA detected by nested PCR was significantly greater than that detected by SBH. The combined concordance of positive and ne gative results between SBH and nested PCR was 61.4%. The discrepancy r esulted mainly from 25 cases (35.7%) that were positive by PCR but neg ative by SBH. A small copy number of HPV DNA in these 25 cases was doc umented by a semi-quantitative PCR method. The nested PCR was more sen sitive than SBH and detected cases with low amounts of HPV DNA. The de tection of HPV infection varied between these two prevailing detection methods and this should be kept in mind in assessing various epidemio logical data concerning HPV infection.