A case of HPV-53-related cervical cancer in an elderly patient

Abstract

Zappacosta et al1 recently published a case report concerning a human papillomavirus (HPV)-positive invasive cervical cancer in a 79-year-old women who had a history of normal Pap smears. In this article, Anyplex II HPV28 (Seegene) is used for HPV genotyping of formalin-fixed paraffin embedded (FFPE) tissue, liquid based cytology (LBC) specimens and urine samples. It is suggested that HPV53 is present exclusively in the cervical cancer cells, lymph node metastases, and atypical urinary cells of one single case while the surrounding CIN2+ tissue revealed ten different HPV strains. Unfortunately, the HPV genotype results for lymph nodes and urinary cells are not presented while these results underline the potential role of HPV53 in oncogenesis. Moreover, it is generally accepted that one lesion is caused by one HPV infection, detection of multiple HPV types thus indicates the presence of multiple infections,2 suggesting that this patient may have several lesions.