Detection of human papillomavirus types 16 and 18 in human neoplastic endometrium: Lack of correlation with established prognostic factors

'High-risk' HPV (types 16 and 18) DNA sequences are present in the majority of precancerous and cancerous lesions of the human uterine cervix. However , data concerning the involvement of HPVs infection in the pathogenesis of endometrial cancer are controversial. In the current study we investigated the frequency of the HPV types 16 and 18, detected by PCR amplification usi ng the type 16-and 18-specific primers within the E7 Open Reading Frame (OR F) sequence, in 54 human endometrial carcinomas obtained from women of Poli sh origin. Moreover, we assessed the possible association of the HPV with t he clinicopathological features of the cancer, patients' outcome as well as with the K-ms codon 12 gene point mutations. HPV type 16 was present in el even out of 54 (20%) endometrial tumors, while HPV type 18 was detected onl y in three out of 54 (4%) neoplasms analyzed. HPV infection was not related either to the patients' age (r=0.11; p=0.428, Spearman correlation test) o r to the clinico-pathological parameters and patients' prognosis. A higher incidence of HPV 16/18 was detected in well (G1) differentiated than in mod erately (G2) and poorly (G3) differentiated endometrial adenocarcinomas, bu t the difference was not statistically significant. Moreover, none of HPV-p ositive endometrial carcinomas harbored K-rns codon 12 gene point mutations . Our results suggest that some of the endometrial carcinomas are associate d with 'high-risk' HPV infection but the presence of the human papillamovir us types 16/18 is not related to the clinico-pathological or prognostical f eatures of the neoplasm.