Human papillomavirus testing for triage in a referral population

This study evaluated the Digene HPV Assay Hybrid Capture System(R) as a triage method.

Results of an HPV assay were compared with a final tissue diagnosis of cervical intraepithelial neoplasia 2 (CIN2) or greater. These results were stratified based on Pap smear diagnosis and evaluated in 4 triage algorithms.

Of the 4 algorithms evaluated, the highest savings came from not performing colposcopy for patients with repeat atypical squamous cells of undetermined significance (ASCUS), but that resulted in missing nine patients with CIN2 and CIN3 histology. HPV testing failed to diagnose 67% (6 out of 9) to 48% (10 out of 21) of patients with underlying CIN2 and CIN3.

Although HPV high-risk positive results correlate with high-grade histology, it is associated with significant false negatives. The HPV low-risk test is not clinically useful. These tests were poor methods to triage patients in our population.