Retrospective analysis of human papillomavirus prevalence in women with cervical pathology

Objective: This study aimed to compare the distribution of different human papillomavirus (HPV) genotypes in various cervical lesions and estimate the prevalence of low-grade squamous intraepithelial lesions (LSIL) and high-grade squamous intraepithelial lesions (HSIL) when one or more HPV genotypes are detected.

Materials and methods: We conducted an analysis of HPV testing using the Quantum-21 test system in 19236 women aged 18–81 years who visited the V.I. Kulakov NMRC for OG&P between November 2011 and April 2022. Among these women, 5700 tested positive for HPV and were included in this analysis. We retrospectively examined the laboratory findings used to confirm this diagnosis. The patients were divided into three groups based on the histological verification of the diagnosis. Group 1 included 186 patients with chronic cervicitis, Group 2 included 341 patients with LSIL, and Group 3 included 292 patients with HSIL.

Results: Analysis of HPV genotype distribution revealed that HPV type 16 was the most prevalent (23.6%), followed by genotypes 44 (12.3%), and 31 (12.3%). The evaluation of HPV genotype prevalence showed that in 66.6% of cases, only one HPV type was detected, whereas in 20.8% of cases, two types were detected. Three types were found in 7.4% of cases and four or more types were detected in 5.2% of cases. Examination of the ratio between single and multiple HPV types revealed that the detection of multiple genotypes was significantly more frequently associated with LSIL than with HSIL (24.9% vs. 5.5%, respectively).

Conclusion: The results of this study demonstrated that the distribution and representation of HPV genotypes in cervical pathology in our sample differed from global trends. Furthermore, the study showed that the detection rate of multiple HPV types decreased with increasing grades of cervical lesions.