Comparison of cycle threshold values of the Cobas HPV test and viral loads of the BMRT HPV test in cervical cancer screening

Qing Yang; Hui Du; Xinfeng Qu; Wenkui Dai; Liming Gui; Changzhong Li; Chun Wang; Chunlei Guo; Yi Zhang; Lihui Wei; J L Belinson; Ruifang Wu

doi:10.3389/fpubh.2022.1010066

Comparison of cycle threshold values of the Cobas HPV test and viral loads of the BMRT HPV test in cervical cancer screening

Front Public Health. 2022 Nov 10:10:1010066. doi: 10.3389/fpubh.2022.1010066. eCollection 2022.

Authors

Qing Yang^{1

2

3}, Hui Du^{1

2

3}, Xinfeng Qu^{1

2}, Wenkui Dai^{1

2

3}, Liming Gui^{1

2

3}, Changzhong Li^{1

2

3}, Chun Wang^{1

2

3}, Chunlei Guo^{1

2

3}, Yi Zhang^{1

2

3}, Lihui Wei⁴, J L Belinson⁵, Ruifang Wu^{1

2

3}

Affiliations

¹ Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Peking University Shenzhen Hospital, Shenzhen, China.
² Institute of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Peking University-Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (PKU-HKUST) Medical Center, Shenzhen, China.
³ Shenzhen Key Laboratory on Technology for Early Diagnosis of Major Gynecologic Diseases, Peking University Shenzhen Hospital, Shenzhen, China.
⁴ Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Peking University People's Hospital, Beijing, China.
⁵ Preventive Oncology International, Inc., The Women's Health Institute, Cleveland Clinic, Cleveland, OH, United States.

Abstract

Objective: To validate the HPV viral loads that are reflected by the cycle threshold values of Cobas4800 as the viral load indicators by verifying the consistency of the viral loads per unit (10,000 cells) from the BMRT assay.

Methods: The analysis is based on data from the Chinese Multi-Center Screening Trial (CHIMUST). The cases included in the analysis are all positive for physician-collected hrHPV on SeqHPV and/or Cobas4800 or negative for hrHPV but abnormal in cytology (≥LSIL), and some cases selected by nested case-control randomization from those negative for physician-collected hrHPV and cytology. With HPV testing results and relevant Ct values from Cobas4800 available, we tested the entire sample set with the BMRT HPV testing assay and analyzed their agreement with Cobas4800, followed by a comparison of the CtV from Cobas4800 and viral loads (lg) from BMRT by lesion grade.

Results: We included 4,485 women (mean age: 45.4 years) in the study, and 4,290 had complete data. The consistency of genotypes from Cobas4800 and BMRT for hrHPV, HPV-16, HPV-18, and 12-HPV pools was 94.9% (4070/4290, Kappa = 0.827), 99.1% (4251/4290, Kappa = 0.842), 99.6% (4,273/4,290, Kappa = 0.777), and 95.3% (4,089/4,290, Kappa = 0.821), respectively. Further analysis shows that any inconsistency between the two assays is likely among samples with comparatively lower viral loads. When analyzing per lesions of CIN2+ and CIN3+, the CtV from Cobas4800 and VL (lg) from BMRT are highly correlated inversely and follow the linear regression for HPV16 and 12-HPV pool (Pearson's or Spearman's correlation coefficient (r): In CIN3+, r _HPV16 = -0.641, P < 0.001; r _12-HPVpool = -0.343, P = 0.109; In CIN2+, r _HPV16 = -0.754, P < 0.001; r _12-HPVpool = -0.429, P < 0.001).

Conclusion: The CtV from Cobas4800 and the viral loads (lg) of per unit cells from the BMRT are well correlated for lesion grading when tested on physician-collected samples. Cobas-CtV is worthy of further study for clinical application.

Keywords: BMRT assay; Cobas4800 assay; cervical cancer; human papillomavirus; viral loads.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

Clinical Trials as Topic
Early Detection of Cancer / methods
Female
Humans
Middle Aged
Papillomavirus Infections* / diagnosis
Uterine Cervical Dysplasia* / diagnosis
Uterine Cervical Dysplasia* / pathology
Uterine Cervical Neoplasms* / diagnosis
Uterine Cervical Neoplasms* / pathology
Viral Load