Clinical manifestations of human papillomavirus infection in nongenital sites.

Our knowledge of warts dates thousands of years. Most warts represent no more than a transient infection in the hands and feet of children and adults. With the relatively recent medical advances permitting the prolonged survival of immunocompromised hosts, however, HPV-induced lesions have become an important problem. In these patients, lesions represent a recurring, intractable infection that predisposes the patient to the development of skin cancer. Such problems have been appreciated for some time in patients with EV. Newer laboratory techniques have led to an increasing number of clinical entities linked with an HPV cause in the nonimmunosuppressed host. Although evidence incriminating HPV as a causative factor for genital cancers of the cervix and the skin continues to mount, such evidence for nongenital Bowen's disease, certain squamous cell carcinomas of the skin, keratoacanthomas, and other tumors of the skin also has begun to grow. It is to be hoped that continued advances in molecular biologic techniques will further delineate the relationship between HPV and these conditions, lead to an HPV classification scheme that is more utilitarian from a clinical point of view, and ultimately lead to improved treatment.