Oropharyngeal cancer, which affects the throat, tongue, soft palate, and tonsils, has become increasingly common among men in the U.S. Because a distinct form of it is caused primarily by HPV (human papillomavirus), a recent study set out to determine the prevalence of oral HPV infection. The results, just published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), found that the higher rate of oropharyngeal cancer among men does indeed correlate with a higher rate of oral HPV infection, when compared with the rest of the population.
The study, conducted as part of the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) of 2009-2010, examined nearly 5,600 participants aged 14 to 69. While the overall prevalence of oral HPV infection was 6.9 percent, the rate was 10.1 percent in men, versus 3.6 percent in women. The researchers also found that behaviors associated with a higher prevalence of oral HPV were similar to those linked to HPV infections at other bodily sites: a history of sexual activity, smoking, and a higher number of lifetime sexual partners. These results, then, should allow for health experts to estimate the prevalence of oral HPV in a given population based on sexual experience and smoking status.
The new findings may be relevant from a preventive perspective, too. A commentary in JAMA suggests that clinicians should encourage their patients who engage in oral sex to use a barrier method, thus reducing the risk of transmitting HPV. “And of course, the higher the uptake of HPV vaccine, the sooner this virus-caused cancer will decline and, eventually — we hope — disappear,” adds ACSH's Dr. Gilbert Ross.
