Identificación de Virus Papiloma Humano 16 (vph-16) en carcinoma queratinizante de pulmón

Abstract

Lung cancer is the first cause of death by cancer in the world and the fourth cause in Chile. The histological type squamous cell carcinoma represents between 35% to 50% of the cases. Strong evidence exists about the association between this histological type and the human papilloma virus (HPV) infection, being genotypes HPV-16 and 18 those that have an strong association. We analyzed cases of lung squamous cell carcinoma of the keratinizing type to evaluate the presence of HPV 16 and 18 genotypes in Chile. Thirteen cases with histological diagnosis of keratinizing highly or moderately differentiated squamous cell carcinoma were analyzed. Samples were formalin-fixed and paraffin-embedded tissue. DNA was extracted with proteinase K and it was amplified by Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) using specific primers for generic HPV, HPV 16, HPV 18 and human betaglobin as internal positive control. The amplified products were revealed in polyacrilamide gels. We identified the presence of HPV in 6 of 13 cases (42.2%). Of these cases, five corresponded to HPV-16 and none of them was HPV 18. The presence of HPV 16 in the analyzed series would indicate that HPV can have some function in the etiology of lung cancer of the keratinizing squamous cell type. The absence of HPV 18 in the analyzed series could indicate unique epidemiological characteristics of our studied population. It is necessary to perform another study with other genotypes of HPV and greater number of cases to confirm these results