Diagnosis of premalignant and malignant cervix diseases in HPV-positive females: Digene test performance evaluation

Abstract

Background. Cervical cancer is one of the most preventable malignancies in females. However, there is an increasing trend of disease incidence mainly due to the low specificity of routine screening tests. Aim. To assess the diagnostic value of standard tests for the diagnosis of cervix disorders based on the Digene test. Materials and methods. The obtained data were processed using the Statistica software package. Due to the unique features of specimens obtained, non-parametric methods were used for small samples with extreme data variability and possible artifacts. These methods do not require an assumption of "normality" of distribution. KruskalWallis rank analysis of variance and MannWhitney test for comparison of individual samples were used to estimate the relationship between the studied parameter and controlled factors. Median (Me) and quartiles (Q1 and Q3) were used in describing the results. Results. The study found a low performance of colposcopy and cytology and a higher performance of status assessment for human papillomavirus. Conclusion. Our findings indicate that viral load measurement is only sometimes informative. This test can be used as a stage 2 screening; additional data are needed for further patient management. Digene test helps to determine the risk group for a follow-up study.