Abstract
AIMS: To test whether human papillomavirus (HPV) variants with large scale sequence alterations to the upstream regulatory region are present in cervical intraepithelial neoplasias (CIN) and cervical carcinomas. METHODS: New PCR based assays were designed specifically to detect large scale insertion/deletion alterations in the upstream regulatory region of HPV 16 and 18. The assays were applied to 24 cases of CIN and 34 cases of cervical carcinoma previously shown to contain these two high risk HPV types. RESULTS: No large scale sequence alterations were found in any of the HPV containing CIN or carcinomas. CONCLUSIONS: These negative findings suggest that major upstream regulatory region variants of HPV 16 and 18 do not contribute to most cervical neoplasms.