A SEER-Based Analysis of Trends in HPV-associated Oropharyngeal Squamous Cell Carcinoma

Background: The trends in the incidence of HPV-associated oropharyngeal squamous cell carcinoma (OPSCC) according to various epidemiologic factors have not been analyzed in detail in previous studies. We aimed to evaluate the trends of HPV-associated OPSCC in the United States. Methods This retrospective cohort study included 13081 patients with OPSCC from large population-based data using Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results (SEER) 2010–2016 database. Patients were diagnosed with OPSCC primarily in the base of tongue, posterior pharyngeal wall, soft palate, and tonsil and were tested for HPV infection status. We analyzed how the trends in the incidence of patients with OPSCC changed according to various demographic factors. Additionally, we forecasted and confirmed the incidence of HPV (+) and (-) patients with OPSCC using the autoregressive integrated moving average (ARIMA) model. Results The incidence of HPV (+) patients with OPSCC has increased over the past 7 years, but the degree of increase varied greatly according to the age, sex, and subsites. The incidence of HPV (-) patients increased until 2014 in all age and sex groups for each site, but did not show clear increasing tendency since then. Appropriate ARIMA models were applied to forecast the incidence of HPV (+) and (-) patients, and the predicted data matched the actual data well. Conclusion This large population-based study suggests that the trends of the incidence in HPV (+) patients with OPSCC has increased and will continue to increase. However, the trends of HPV (+) and (-) patients differed greatly according to various demographic factors. These results present a direction for establishing appropriate preventive measures to deal with HPV-related OPSCC in more detail.