Oropharyngeal carcinoma in non-smokers and non-drinkers: A role for HPV

Human Papillomavirus Infection and Prognostic Predictors in Patients with Oropharyngeal Squamous Cell Carcinoma

“…Our results provide evidence that HPV positive OSCC is a distinct entity and tumor HPV status is an independent prognostic factor for patients with OSCC, which is consistent with the hypothesis that has been reported in several other studies (Gillison et al, 2000;Klussmann et al, 2001;Weinberger et al, 2006;Hafkamp et al, 2008;Worden et al, 2008;Andrews et al, 2009;Dayyani et al, 2010). On the basis of our results, we believe that future clinical trials should be designed for patients nationwide with OSCC and further information could be obtained to determine whether treatment affects the survival outcomes stratified by tumor HPV status.…”

“…Consistent with the literature (Klussmann et al, 2001;Hafkamp et al, 2008;Andrews et al, 2009), HPV positive tumors in this study were more likely to occur in female patients, nonsmokers and non-drinkers (p=0.002, 0.001 and 0.001, respectively). HPV positive tumors trended towards being poorly differentiated, though we did not find any statistically significant difference.…”

“…Recent studies have shown an etiologic role of infection with high-risk human papillomavirus (HR-HPV) in a subset of oropharyngeal squamous cell carcinomas (OSCC) that present with a distinct biologic behavior (Gillison et al, 2000;Andrews et al, 2009;Joo et al, 2011;Klussmann et al, 2001). HPV-DNA is detected in approximately 19%-75% of all squamous cell carcinomas of oropharynx worldwide, 85%-95% of which are of the HPV-16 type (Gillison et al, 2000;Kreimer et al, 2005).…”

Asymptomatic oral human papillomavirus (HPV) infection in women with a histopathologic diagnosis of genital HPV

“…Preliminary studies reported that alcohol consumption is a behavioral risk factor (13,14,33) for oral HPV infection, and we also observed a statistically significant association with oral HPV detection (P < 0.01), even in the absence of clinical manifestations. Alcoholic beverages might facilitate oral viral infection by interfering with the integrity of the oral mucosa or with homeostatic balance in the buccal cavity.…”

Biopsy vs. brushing: Comparison of two sampling methods for the detection of HPV-DNA in squamous cell carcinoma of the oral cavity

“…According to the latest report of the Italian Association of Cancer Registries (AIRTUM, http://www.registri-tumori.it/cms_en/), the incidence of OSCC in southern Italy is moderately high (about 11/100,000 cases per year). Although smoking tobacco and alcohol abuse are the main risk factors, a fraction of patients with OSCC are non-smokers and non-drinker subjects, 9 and an HPV-induced carcinogenesis has been proposed 10,11 ; this particularly regards young patients and those with behavioural risk factors (a history of a high number of sexual partners and practising oral sex). 12,13 It has been reported in recent years that a significant share (about 60%) of oropharyngeal cancers (base of the tongue and tonsillar SCC) harbour HPV DNA and thus they could be HPV-related.…”