Background: The incidence of p16+ oropharyngeal squamous cell carcinoma (OPSCC) has been increasing. The notion that p16+ OPSCC has a propensity for atypical and disseminating metastasis has gained traction. We compared treatment failure patterns in p16+ and p16- OPSCC and evaluated survival impact.
Methods: Retrospective analysis of patients with recurrent/metastatic OPSCC disease between 1/2009 and 12/2019.
Results: Thirty-eight p16+ and 36 p16- patients were identified. Three distinct failure patterns (distant vs. locoregional, atypical vs. typical, and disseminating vs. non-disseminating) were studied. No significant differences were found between p16+ and p16- patients. Multivariate analysis showed p16 status was an independent prognostic biomarker; p16+ patients have a favorable overall survival compared to p16- patients (HR 0.34, 95% CI 0.16-0.77; P = .005).
Conclusions: We challenge the view that p16+ OPSCC exhibits a distinctive treatment failure pattern and showed that p16 status impacts patient survival independent of disease progression.
Keywords: disease progression; head and neck cancer; oropharyngeal cancer; p16; treatment failure.
© 2022 The Authors. Laryngoscope Investigative Otolaryngology published by Wiley Periodicals LLC on behalf of The Triological Society.