Human papillomavirus genotypes in Iranian patients with cervical cancer

Abstract The aim of this study was to determine the frequency of HPV genotypes isolated from cervical intra-epithelial neoplasia grade III and invasive carcinomas of Iranian patients. A total of 94 cases were selected in five years from 2003 to 2007. After nucleic acid purification, real-time PCR was performed by means of GP5+/GP6+ primers. Subsequently, PCR products were sequenced, on the basis of which a phylogenetic tree was constructed. Negative samples and twelve randomly selected positive samples were also typed by reverse hybridization to increase the sensitivity and to confirm the results. Of 94 evaluated samples, 7 were negative for internal control gene and were excluded from the study. The overall genotyping results of phylogenetic analysis and hybridization methods were as follows: HPV 16: 75% (65/87); HPV 18: 3% (2/87); HPV 31: 1% (1/87); HPV 45: 1% (1/87). High frequency of HPV 16 and low frequency of HPV 18 were found in this study. Information about HPV genotype distribution is important in cervical cancer screening and prevention.