Human papilloma virus (HPV) is highly frequent among patients with anal squamous cell carcinoma, but the viral load (VL) differs between patients. This study aimed to compare the rate of HPV positivity, HPV16VL, p16INK4A and p53 expression between treatment naive and recurrent anal cancer patients. HPV was genotyped via AmpliSens® HPV HCR-genotype-titre-FRT kit. HPV16 VL was determined via quantitative polymerase chain reaction-based in-house test. p16INK4A and p53 expression was tested via immunohistochemistry. The cohort comprised 13 treatment-naive and 17 recurrent anal SCC patients. High-risk HPV was detected in 87% of cases, and HPV16 (73%) was the predominant genotype. The rate of HPV positivity was higher among women and nonsmokers, and majority of HPV-positive cases were also p16INK4A-positive. All p53-negative tumors were HPV16-positive. The most predominant p53 staining pattern in the HPV-positive group was scattered type, whereas it was diffuse type in the HPV-negative group. The HPV16 VL was higher in the treatment-naive group. Further, in the treatment-naive group, cases with scattered staining pattern of p53 had higher HPV16 VL than cases with diffuse staining pattern. The opposite result was noted in the recurrent cancer group. Moreover, p16-positive cases with scattered p53 staining pattern in the treatment naive group had higher HPV16 VL than their counterparts in the recurrent cancer group. In conclusion, the HPV VL, as is the association between VL and p16INK4A /p53, is in an inversed trend in treatment naive and recurrent cancer patients, highlighting the importance of HPV VL measurement in anal SCC.

中文翻译：

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HPV16病毒载量测试在肛门癌中的意义。

人乳头瘤病毒（HPV）在肛门鳞状细胞癌患者中非常常见，但患者的病毒载量（VL）不同。这项研究的目的是比较初治和复发性肛门癌患者之间HPV阳性率，HPV16VL，p16INK4A和p53表达的比率。通过AmppliSens？HPV HCR基因型滴定FRT试剂盒对HPV进行基因分型。HPV16 VL是通过基于定量聚合酶链反应的内部测试确定的。通过免疫组织化学测试p16INK4A和p53表达。该队列包括13名未接受过治疗的患者和17名复发性肛门SCC患者。在87％的病例中检测到高风险的HPV，主要的基因型是HPV16（73％）。女性和非吸烟者的HPV阳性率更高，大多数HPV阳性病例也为p16INK4A阳性。所有p53阴性肿瘤均为HPV16阳性。HPV阳性组中最主要的p53染色模式是分散型，而HPV阴性组中则是弥散型。初治组HPV16 VL较高。此外，在未进行过治疗的组中，p53散在染色模式的病例比弥散染色在病例中的HPV16 VL更高。在复发性癌症组中发现了相反的结果。此外，与未治疗组相比，未治疗组中p16阳性且p53染色呈散乱的病例的HPV16 VL更高。总之，HPV VL以及VL和p16INK4A / p53之间的关联在治疗初治和复发癌症患者中呈相反的趋势，突出了HPV VL测量在肛门SCC中的重要性。