Human Papilloma Virus Prevalence in Hyperplastic Tonsils and Adenoids in Children and Young Adults

Objective: Our aim was to determine HPV prevalence and genotypes in nontumoral tonsillar and/or adenoid tissue in young adults to open a discussion about the rationale of HPV detection in tonsil and adenoid tissues because of the cancer development risk. Material and Methods: Archived resection materials of 258 patients treated between 2003 and 2007 were retrieved for HPV detection and typing. Sections of formalin-fixed, paraffin-blocked tissue samples of each resected material were used as the DNA source. Six patients were excluded because of the inadequate quality of the extracted DNA. The age range of the remaining 252 patients was between 5 and 21 years (11.94 +/- 4.20). After PCR screening, four different sets of primers covering 18 HPV types were used for HPV genotyping by multiplex polymerase chain reaction (MPCR). Results: Sixteen of the 252 surgical samples, namely nine of 114 tonsillectomies (7.9%), four of 87 adenoidectomies (4.6%), and 3 of 51 adenotonsillectomy tissues (5.9%) were found to contain the HPV genome (6.3%). Genotypes revealed that HPV-16 was the dominant genotype, found in 11 cases, followed by HPV-6/11 in four cases, and HPV-31 in one case. Conclusion: The prevalence of HPV in children and young adults that suffered from upper airway obstruction due to nontumoral tonsil and/or adenoid overgrowth was found to be 6.3% in our study. This study reveals the need for further molecular assists for HPV under the light of 6.3% of detected HPV prevalence and the high risk HPV type 16 predominance. Since the oncogenic risk, we strongly suggest evaluation of HPV in tonsillectomy and adenoidectomy material similar to oropharyngeal squamous etithelium.