Association of HPV infections with second primary tumors in early-staged oral cavity cancer

Oral Diseases (2012) 18 , 809–815 Objective: The infection of human papilloma virus (HPV) has been reported in head and neck cancer; however, the clinical significance of HPV infection on the pathogenesis of oral cavity squamous cell carcinoma (OSCC) is still uncertain. Materials and Methods: The study recruited 103 patients with pathological early‐stage OSCC between March 1997 and December 2003 from Chang Gung Memorial Hospital, Taiwan. Tumor specimens were HPV‐genotyped by the EasychipVR HPV Blot method. Clinical association study was performed by using chi‐square, Kaplan–Meier, and logrank tests. Results: Thirty‐one patients (30.1%) were positive for HPV infection. The most frequent HPV types were types 16 (16 patients, 51.6%) and 18 (seven patients, 22.6%). HPV infection was not associated with tumor aggressiveness (pathological tumor stage or differentiation status), risk exposure (alcohol, cigarette, or areca quid chewing habit), or the treatment outcome (disease‐free survival or overall survival). However, infection with HPV‐18 was associated with the occurrence of a second primary cancers (P = 0.033), indicating the infection of HPV in OSCC enhances the susceptibility of developing secondary malignancy. Conclusions: There are 30% of the patients with OSCC infected with HPV, with most high‐risk types. HPV‐18 infection may enhance the susceptibility of second primary tumors. Large scale of validation study will be needed to confirm this result.