Open Access

Fabian Lohaus, Annett Linge, Inge Tinhofer, Volker Budach, Eleni Gkika, Martin Stuschke, Panagiotis Balermpas, Claus Rödel, Melanie Avlar, Anca-Ligia Grosu, Amir Abdollahi, Jürgen Debus, Christine Bayer, Claus Belka, Steffi Pigorsch, Stephanie Combs, David Mönnich, Daniel Zips, Cläre von Neubeck, Gustavo Bruno Baretton, Steffen Löck, Howard D. Thames, Mechthild Krause, Michael Baumann

• Objective: To investigate the impact of HPV status in patients with locally advanced head and neck squamous cell carcinoma (HNSCC), who received surgery and cisplatin-based postoperative radiochemotherapy. Materials and methods: For 221 patients with locally advanced squamous cell carcinoma of the hypopharynx, oropharynx or oral cavity treated at the 8 partner sites of the German Cancer Consortium, the impact of HPV DNA, p16 overexpression and p53 expression on outcome were retrospectively analysed. The primary endpoint was loco-regional tumour control; secondary endpoints were distant metastases and overall survival. Results: In the total patient population, univariate analyses revealed a significant impact of HPV16 DNA positivity, p16 overexpression, p53 positivity and tumour site on loco-regional tumour control. Multivariate analysis stratified for tumour site showed that positive HPV 16 DNA status correlated with loco-regional tumour control in patients with oropharyngeal carcinoma (p = 0.02) but not in the oral cavity carcinoma group. Multivariate evaluation of the secondary endpoints in the total population revealed a significant association of HPV16 DNA positivity with overall survival (p < 0.01) but not with distant metastases. Conclusions: HPV16 DNA status appears to be a strong prognosticator of loco-regional tumour control after postoperative cisplatin-based radiochemotherapy of locally advanced oropharyngeal carcinoma and is now being explored in a prospective validation trial.