Acquisition of Genetic Aberrations During the Progression of High-Grade Intraepithelial Lesions/Micro-Invasive Squamous Cancers to Widely Invasive Cervical Squamous Cell Cancer.

CONTEXT.—: Acquisition of genetic aberrations during cervical carcinogenesis in individual patients is poorly documented.

OBJECTIVE.—: To provide a comparative analysis of high-grade squamous intraepithelial lesions (n = 7) and pT1a squamous cancers (n = 1) and their recurrences, subsequent widely invasive cancers, and metastases developed during 1-24 years.

DESIGN.—: Archival tissues of 8 patients were analyzed immunohistochemically for reserve-cell origin, human papillomavirus genotypes, mutations in 50 cancer genes, and chromosomal copy number variations.

RESULTS.—: Intraepithelial lesions arose either from cytokeratin 17- or 7-expressing reserve cells. All preinvasive and invasive tumors carried human papillomavirus high-risk genotypes and lacked somatic mutations. Chromosomal copy number variations were identified in all intraepithelial lesions and invasive cancers. Four of 8 high-grade intraepithelial lesions progressed to invasive cancer after incomplete treatment, and 4 of 8 invasive cancers arose de novo after in sano resection. Four of 8 cancers carried mutations with high mutational frequency (PIK3CA-E545K [n = 2]; PIK3CA and SMAD1 [n = 1]; HRAS, RB1, and EGFR [n = 1]), as did their corresponding regional metastases. One nonmetastasized cancer had a subclonal PIK3CA mutation, and an initially nonmutated, low-stage cancer developed ovarian metastases with PIK3CA amplification. One patient had neither mutations nor metastases. The patient with treated PIK3CA-E545K-mutated pT1a cancer developed a subsequent nonmutated intraepithelial lesion that progressed to invasive cancer with a subclonal PIK3CA-H1047R mutation. Cancer-related deaths in 4 of 8 (50%) patients occurred independent of mutational status or metastatic disease.

CONCLUSIONS.—: Recurrences arose after persistent or de novo human papillomavirus infection of residual reserve cells or squamous metaplasia. Activating driver mutations were identified in invasive cancers only. High mutational load correlated with metastases, which in turn represented clonal disease.