To increase the participation in the cervical screening program in the Capital Region of Denmark, HPV-based self-sampling was offered free of charge as an opt-in strategy to screening non-attenders. Here, we compared the HPV prevalence and genotype distribution between self-sampling participants and the women who regularly participate in screening. To increase the participation in the cervical screening program in the Capital Region of Denmark, HPV-based self-sampling was offered free of charge as an opt-in strategy to screening non-attenders. Here, we compared the HPV prevalence and genotype distribution between self-sampling participants and the women who regularly participate in screening.
Women from the Capital Region who were not screened in the last screening round or longer (N= 54,585) and their screening history were identified from the invitational module of the nationwide Pathology Data Bank. HPV prevalence was determined by using the CLART HPV2 assay (Genomica, Madrid, Spain). Screening history was categorized as intermittently screened (screened within the last 10 years but not within the last screening round) or long-term unscreened (not screened in the last 10 years or more). The results reported herein are based on the 4823 self-sampling brushes from 23,632 invited women. Data for regularly screened women are from the Danish Horizon study.
Twenty-three samples (0.5%) had an invalid result on the CLART assay. The overall HR-HPV prevalence in the study was 11.3%, with 11.2% in intermittently screened women, and 11.4% in long-term unscreened women. In comparison, routinely screened women had an HPV prevalence of 15.8%. In intermittently screened women, the most prevalent high-risk HPV genotypes were 16, 51, 31, and 52 (8.1%, 6.2%, 4.9%, and 4.7%, respectively), whereas the most prevalent genotypes in long-term unscreened women were 16, 51, 52, and 31 (9.1% 6.3%, 4.6%, and 4.3%, respectively). Among women undergoing routine screening, the most prevalent HPV types were 16, 52, 31 and 58 (8.8%, 6.5%, 5.8% and 5.1% respectively). HPV61 was the most prevalent low-risk HPV genotype in both the intermittently screened and long-term unscreened women, with 10.5% and 11.4%, respectively, whereas among regularly screened women this was HPV53 with 7.3%.
Differences in HPV prevalence and genotype frequency between under-screened women participating in self-sampling and regularly screened women were observed, though the differences were small.