BioProject

Background: Human papillomavirus has been shown to have a causal role in the development of head and neck squamous cell carcinoma and represents a distinct and well-defined pathology. More...

Background: Human papillomavirus has been shown to have a causal role in the development of head and neck squamous cell carcinoma and represents a distinct and well-defined pathology. While HPV-positive HNSCC is associated with a better response to treatment and prognosis, a subset of patients do not respond favorably to current standard of care thus suffering unnecessary morbidity and delay to receive effective therapy. Methods: RNA from nineteen patients with HPV-positive HNSCC was subjected to gene expression analysis using Affymetrix microarrays. HPV-status was confirmed by detection of HPV16 E7 with RT-PCR. Results: In addition to specific genetic biomarkers (including LCE3D, KRTDAP, HMOX1, KRT19, MDK, TSPAN1), differentially expressed genes were highly represented in the cell processes of genomic stability, cell cycle, and DNA damage. Conclusions: This pilot study suggests possible biomarkers that predict response to chemoradiation therapy. These data can potentially lead to an assay that can be used clinically to predict HPV-positive HNSCC patients that will not benefit from chemoradiation, thus helping clinicians to lower morbidity and get selected patients to surgery faster. Overall design: HPV-positive head and neck squamous cell carcinoma (HNSCC) has a good prognosis with a large percentage of patients responding to therapy. However, a certain percentage of patients do not respond. Gene expression data from Affymetrix Human Exon 1.0ST microarrays was utilized to compare patients that responded to therapy with those that did not respond. Less...