Human papillomavirus infection in nasal polyps in a Chinese population

In order to determine the prevalence and genotype distribution of human papillomavirus (HPV) infection in patients with nasal polyps, a total of 204 patients with nasal polyps and 36 healthy controls were recruited for this study. Genomic DNA was extracted from paraffin-embedded tissue sections. HPV DNA genotyping was achieved by a flow-through hybridization and gene-chip method. HPV-positive infection was identified in 82 of 204 (40.2 %) patients, while HPV DNA was not found in healthy controls (P<0.05). Genotyping analysis showed that low-risk HPV genotype 11 was the most prevalent type of HPV in nasal polyps (45.28 %). Both single and multiple HPV genotype infections were found in these HPV-positive cases, although most (74.39 %) were infected with a single genotype. In addition, there was no correlation between HPV infection or HPV subtypes and the clinicopathological characteristics of patients, such as age, gender, number of surgery and disease course. The data from our study clearly demonstrated that HPV infection was associated with nasal polyps. Both high-risk HPV and low-risk HPV (LR-HPV) genotypes were identified in nasal polyp tissues, and LR-HPV-11 was the most prevalent type. Future research will explore the association of HPV infection with the development and progression of nasal polyps.