DIFFERENT DETECTABILITY OF HIGH-RISK HPV IN SMEARS FROM INCIDENT AND PREVALENT HIGH-GRADE SQUAMOUS INTRAEPITHELIAL LESIONS OF THE CERVIX

Human papillomavirus (HPV) status in cervical smears from cervical int raepithelial neoplasia (GIN) 2/3 diagnosed in 36 of 892 women with a h istory of normal cytology and colposcopy (incident CIN 2/3) was compar ed with CIN 2/3 in 40 patients with a history of abnormal cytology (pr evalent CIN 2/3). In all patients cervical smears for HPV testing and cytology and two cervigrams were taken. The scrapes were collected in hybrid capture assay solution and analyzed with the hybrid capture and general primer/type-specific primer polymerase chain reaction system (GP/TS-PCR) after DNA extraction. Patients with incident and prevalent CIN 2/3 were similar with respect to age. By GP/TS-PCR carried out un der suboptimal conditions due to DNA extraction, HPV DNA was detected in 69.4% (25 of 36) of smears from incident CIN 2/3 compared to 95% (3 8 of 40) in prevalent CIN 2/3 (P = 0.003). Using hybrid capture, smear s of incident CIN 2/3 were HPV positive in 50% (18 of 36) compared to 80% (32 of 40) in prevalent CIN 2/3 (P = 0.006). High-risk HPVs were s ignificantly less common in smears from incident CIN 2/3 compared with prevalent CIN 2/3: 36.1% vs 72.5% by GP/TS-PCR (P = 0.001) and 47.2% vs 80% by hybrid capture assay (P = 0.003), respectively. Virus load i n HPV-positive smears of prevalent CIN 2/3 was significantly higher th an of incident CIN 2/3 using semiquantitative PCR (P = 0.0005). Thus, high-risk HPV types were detected less frequently and in lower concent ration in smears from incident CIN 2/3 than in smears from prevalent C IN 2/3. (C) 1997 Academic Press.