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Prevalence of human Papillomavirus DNA in eyebrow hairs plucked from patients with psoriasis treated with TNF inhibitors
Author(s) -
Bellaud G.,
Gheit T.,
Pugin A.,
Prétet J. L.,
Tommasino M.,
Mougin C.,
Aubin F.
Publication year - 2014
Publication title -
journal of the european academy of dermatology and venereology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.655
H-Index - 107
eISSN - 1468-3083
pISSN - 0926-9959
DOI - 10.1111/jdv.12308
Subject(s) - medicine , psoriasis , methotrexate , tumor necrosis factor alpha , dermatology , eyebrow , genotyping , immunology , gastroenterology , surgery , genotype , biochemistry , chemistry , gene
Background Tumour necrosis factor alpha (TNF‐α) inhibitors are associated with an increased risk of infections and with a still debatable risk of skin cancer. Furthermore, cutaneous human papillomavirus (HPV) infection may be involved in skin cancer. Objectives Our primary objective was to assess the HPV DNA prevalence in psoriasis patients treated with TNF inhibitors and the secondary objective was to assess the same parameter before and during treatment. Methods Plucked eyebrow hairs were collected from 151 consecutive patients with moderate to severe chronic plaque psoriasis, including 48 patients treated with anti‐TNF‐α agents, 21 patients treated with methotrexate (MTX) and 82 patients with no previous systemic treatment. Among them, 38 patients were subsequently treated with either MTX or anti‐TNF‐α agents. HPV genotyping was performed using the HPV type‐specific E7 PCR bead‐based multiplex allowing the detection of 27 genus‐α types, 25 genus‐β types, 16 genus‐γ types and one single genus‐μ type. Follow‐up provided a total of 972.7 person‐months of overall exposure for patients treated with TNF inhibitors and 326.9 person‐months for patients treated with MTX. Results Our data confirm the high prevalence of β‐HPV infection in healthy skin of psoriasis patients (68.9%), with no significant difference between untreated patients (64.6%), patients treated with MTX (76.2%) and patients treated with anti‐TNF‐α agents (72.9%). The mean number of different HPV types and the distribution of HPV types were similar in different groups of patients. Moreover, in prospectively treated patients, we did not observe any change in the HPV DNA prevalence in the distribution of HPV types and the number of HPV types after a mean duration of treatment of 332 ± 39.8 days. Conclusion Despite the small number of patients in our cohort, our results are quite encouraging in view of the increased use of anti‐TNF‐α agents in different auto inflammatory immune diseases.