HPV TESTING IN CERVICAL CANCER PREVENTION

Despite the introduction of HPV vaccines and its clinical application expanded during the last decade with increasing vaccine coverage, cervical cancer prevention still requires continuing and widespread screening activity. Based on the knowledge about the impact of HPV on cell cycle control mechanisms, tests for detection of HPV DNA, host cellular proteins or HPV proteins have been developed and introduced to clinical application. Among them, tests able to detect DNA of high-risk HPVs have been widely used worldwide and start to be evidenced as a valuable screening test in cervical cancer prevention. Hybrid Capture II (HCII, Qiagen, USA) using DNA hybridization and signals amplification technique is the FDA and EC approved test, which can detect and differentiated any type from 13 high-risk HPV types (16, 18, 31, 33, 35, 39, 45, 51, 52, 56, 58, 59 and 68) and 5 low-risk HPV types (6, 11, 42, 43, 44). The introduction of a newly developed HPV test using simpler technology and affordable cost - careHPV - and its commercialization in the very near future, in combination with visual inspection with acetic acid and/or colposcopy will allow the implementation of new approaches with higher coverage and a more effective strategy of screening – diagnosis – management.