Human papillomavirus-related anogenital premalignancies and cancer in renal transplant recipients: A Danish nationwide, registry-based cohort study

Abstract

In this registry-based cohort study, we estimated the risk of human papillomavirus (HPV)-related anogenital premalignancies and cancer in renal transplant recipients (RTRs) compared to a nontransplanted comparison cohort. We identified all first-time RTRs in Denmark during 1990-2015 in a nationwide nephrology register. For each RTR, we randomly selected 50 age- and sex-matched non-RTRs from the background population. The study population was followed for diagnoses of cervical, vaginal, vulvar, penile and anal intraepithelial neoplasia grades 2-3 (IN2/3) and cancer for up to 27 years. We estimated hazard ratios (HRs) of anogenital IN2/3 and cancer in RTRs vs. non-RTRs by Cox regression separately for men and women using age as underlying timescale, adjusting for income, education, HPV vaccination and immunocompromising conditions. We included 4,261 RTRs and 213,673 non-RTRs. RTRs had increased hazard of cervical (HR = 2.1, 95% CI: 1.7-2.8), vaginal (HR = 35.0, 95% CI: 13.9-87.7), vulvar (HR = 16.4, 95% CI: 10.4-25.8), penile (HR = 21.9, 95% CI: 11.1-43.5) and anal (women: HR = 51.1, 95% CI: 28.0-93.1; men: HR = 39.0, 95% CI: 16.7-91.1) IN2/3. The HRs of anogenital cancers were also increased at most sites. The HR of anogenital IN2/3 in female RTRs tended to be higher during graft function than during dialysis. In female RTRs aged <40 years at transplantation, 10-15% had cervical IN2/3 and 5-12% had vaginal/vulvar/anal IN2/3 within 20 years after transplantation, compared to 4-8 and 0.2-0.4%, respectively, of female non-RTRs. In conclusion, RTRs had substantially higher risk of HPV-related anogenital premalignancies and cancer than non-RTRs.