© 2002 Journal of Clinical Pathology
EDITORIAL
Cervical cancer
Cervical cancer
1 Department of Pathology, VU University Medical Centre, De Boelelaan 1117, 1081 HV Amsterdam, the Netherlands
2 Formerly at Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children NHS Trust, London WC1N 3 JH, UK.
Correspondence to:
Correspondence to:
Dr PJ van Diest, Department of Pathology, Vrije Universiteit Medical Centre, De Boelelaan 1117, 1081 HV Amsterdam, the Netherlands;
pj.vandiest@vumc.nl
A sexually transmitted disease?
Keywords: cervical cancer; human papillomavirus; cervical screening; vaccination
Abbreviations: EBV, Epstein-Barr virus; HPV, human papillomavirus
Cervical cancer continues to be a major health care problem worldwide. Over the past few decades, it has become more and more apparent that the human papillomavirus (HPV) is strongly associated with cervical cancer. Several other associations between infections with microorganisms and cancer have been described, such as Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) and gastric cancer,1 lymphoepithelioma-like cancer,2 and lymphomas3–10; Helicobacter pylori and gastric cancer11–18 and mucosa associated lymphoid tissue lymphoma19,20; and human herpesvirus 8 and Kaposi sarcoma.21–23 However, these associations are of a different strength. For example, H pylori is probably indirectly related to gastric cancer—it causes a chronic infection that may eventually lead to atrophy, intestinal metaplasia, dysplasia, and cancer. The relation between EBV and lymphoma is biologically stronger because EBV produces proteins with oncogenic properties. Real causal relations between microorganisms and cancer are difficult to prove. This requires many well designed studies providing evidence on
CiteULike 
Complore 
Connotea 
Del.icio.us 
Digg 
Reddit 
Technorati What's this?
- Full Text
- Full Text (PDF)
- Submit a response
- Alert me when this article is cited
- Alert me when eLetters are posted
- Alert me if a correction is posted
- Citation Map
Services
- Email this link to a friend
- Similar articles in this journal
- Similar articles in PubMed
- Add article to my folders
- Download to citation manager
- Request Permissions
Citing Articles
Google Scholar
PubMed
Topic Collections
-
Cervical cancer
-
Gynecological cancer
-
Cervical screening
-
Immunology (including allergy)
- Pancreatic cancer
Bookmark with
Register for free content
The full back archive is now available for all BMJ Journals. Institutional subscribers may access the entire archive as part of their subscription. Personal subscribers will also have access to all content when logged in. Non-subscribers who register have free access to all articles published before 2006 right back to volume 1 issue 1. Register here to access the free archive of all BMJ Journals.
Don't forget to sign up for content alerts so you keep up to date with all the articles as they are published.
