Human Papillomavirus and Rising Oropharyngeal Cancer Incidence in the United States

PURPOSE Recent increases in incidence and survival of oropharyngeal cancers in the United States have been attributed to human papillomavirus (HPV) infection, but empirical evidence is lacking. PATIENTS AND METHODS HPV status was determined for all 271 oropharyngeal cancers (1984-2004) collected by the three population-based cancer registries in the Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results (SEER) Residual Tissue Repositories Program by using polymerase chain reaction and genotyping (Inno-LiPA), HPV16 viral load, and HPV16 mRNA expression. Trends in HPV prevalence across four calendar periods were estimated by using logistic regression. Observed HPV prevalence was reweighted to all oropharyngeal cancers…