We examined host p53 codon 72 genotype frequencies and found that patients with cervical abnormalities and women with HPV16 and HPV18 infections had a lower genotype frequency of the homozygous (AA) previously reported to be associated with cervical cancer, than uninfected women with no abnormalities.
The objective was to evaluate the role of human papillomavirus (HPV) in the pathogenesis of papillary squamous cell carcinoma (PSCC) of the cervix and to determine cell proliferative activity and p53 abnormalities in these rare variants of cervical cancer.
Although the p53 arginine allele is itself an important risk factor for cervical cancer, the combined risk with LOH of Rb, which appears to be greater, might indicate a possible epistatic effect of the two genes/polymorphisms.
The frequency of distribution of the three genotypes of p53 codon 72 in a subgroup of the HPV16/18-positive cervical cancer patients was Pro/Pro 0.18 and Arg/Arg 0.26, with the heterozygous Pro/Arg 0.56, differing significantly from the genotype frequency in the normal healthy women (chi(2) = 6.928, df = 2, P < 0.05).
The association between human papillomavirus (HPV)-associated cervical cancer and cutaneous squamous cell carcinoma and codon 72 polymorphism in the p53 gene is not unequivocal.
Our results indicate that there is no association between the presence of the Arg allele in codon 72 of TP53 polymorphism and risk of cervical cancer in our population.
Since polymorphism of the p53 itself as well as in combination with HPV infection may not be a genetic risk for cervical cancer, much attention should be paid to other risk factors such as sexual behavior and smoking.
Many epidemiological studies have investigated the relationship between p53 codon 72 polymorphism and cervical cancer risk, but the findings are still conflicting.
These data suggest that there are significant associations between the miR-502-binding site SNP in the 3'-UTR of SET8 and the TP53 codon 72 polymorphism with cervical cancer in Chinese, and there is a gene-gene interaction.
However, few reports have corroborated this data, and the role of the p53 codon 72 polymorphism in the development of cervical cancer requires further elucidation.
The p21 arginine allele was significantly associated with CaCx in the p53 proline non-homozygous group of subjects (OR(age-adjusted) = 2.68; 95% CI: 1.21-5.91; P = 0.01), and specifically in the p53 heterozygous group (OR(age-adjusted) = 2.91; 95% CI = 1.12-7.56; P = 0.03).
Although a high incidence of HPV DNA integration and a low incidence of p53 mutation were confirmed in cancer of the uterine cervix, there was no inverse association between integration of HPV types 16 and/or 18 DNA and p53 mutation.
Although genetic variation in TP53 might affect the natural history of HPV and cervical cancer, further work is needed to elucidate the possible mechanism.
No evidence of correlation between polymorphism at codon 72 of p53 and risk of cervical cancer in Japanese patients with human papillomavirus 16/18 infection.