DNA ANALYSIS INDICATES PATIENT-SPECIFIC HUMAN PAPILLOMAVIRUS TYPE-16 STRAINS IN BOWENS-DISEASE ON FINGERS AND IN ARCHIVAL SAMPLES FROM GENITAL DYSPLASIA

Human papillomavirus (HPV) type 16 is causally involved in the pathoge nesis of anogenital cancer and has also been demonstrated in some pati ents with Bowen's disease (BD) on the fingers. From two women with HPV 16 in BD on the fingers, and in archival samples from genital dysplas ia, collected as long as 26 years ago, the non-coding region of the vi rus was amplified by the polymerase chain reaction and sequenced. The HPV 16 DNA sequences found in the finger lesions and in the genital ar chival samples showed no diversities within single patients. Compared with an HPV 16R reference sequence, one patient showed a unique T nucl eotide at position 78, whereas the other patient exhibited T and A nuc leotides at positions 7193 and 7521, respectively. In one of the patie nts, the same strain of HPV 16 was found in a digital tumour 26 years after its clearance from the genital tract. DNA sequence analysis indi cated patient-specific HPV 16 strains. Auto-inoculation from the genit al tract was favoured as a plausible explanation of why HPV 16 caused BD on the fingers.