Abstract C22: Telomerase activity and HR‐HPV infection frequently are present before detection of high grade cervical lesions

Telomerase activation have been considered as a fundamental step in the immortalization process because majority nonmalignant somatic tissue shows undetectable or no telomerase activity. A few numbers of studies in cervical cancer have showed an increase in the telomerase activity with grade of lesion, and Human Papillomavirus (HPV) infection has been associated in some studies with telomerase activation. However until now there are not follow up studies that measure the telomerase activity along the time. We describe here results about telomerase activity and HPV infection during 7 years of follow up in women that belong to the Bogota cohort. Samples were obtained every six months during follow up and we had in average four samples by woman. Telomerase activity was analyzed in 58 samples of 17 women that during follow up developed High Grade Squamous Intraepithelial Lesions (HGSIL) and 149 samples of 34 women that during follow up had normal cytology using a TeloTAGGG Telomerase PCR ELISA kit (Roche Applied Science). The HPV infection was previously tested using a GP5+/GP6+mediated PCR‐EIA and typing using a Reverse Line Blot assay (RLB). Of the 17 women that developed HGSIL along follow up; 12 (70.5%) had HPV infection and telomerase activity at the same time of HGSIL diagnosis or in a previous visit, these women had infections with high risk types (HR) principally with those belong to the alpha 9 specie, 2 (17.7%) showed only transitory events of HPV infection and 2 (11.8%) had normal cytology without HPV infection or telomerase activity. Average time to develop HGSIL was 13.5 months. In normal women we observed diverse results. Of the 34 women; 21 (61.8%) had HPV transitory infections with high risk and/or low risk types sometime during follow up and only 12 (35.2%) of them were positive for telomerase activity sometime in follow up independently of HPV infection. Interestingly, 8 (23.5%) women had HPV‐HR infection during follow up and they were never positive for telomerase activity and 5 (14.7%) women didn9t have HPV infection and telomerase activity. Detection of HR‐HPV infection and telomerase activity at the same time likes to predict the risk of HGSIL. Our results support the idea that telomerase activity and HR‐HPV infection can be used as progression markers for the development of HGSIL. Citation Information: Cancer Res 2009;69(23 Suppl):C22.