Prevalence of Human Herpesvirus-8 (HHV-8) in untreated patients with early stage Mycosis Fungoides (A retrospective study)

Background : Human herpesvirus 8 (HHV-8), also known as Kaposi’s Sarcoma – associated herpesvirus (KSHV) was first identified and detected in 1994 in patients with Kaposi’s Sarcoma. Recently, a strong association has been shown between HHV-8 and large-plaque parapsoriasis and mycosis fungoides(MF). This association has been attributed to either recent infection or reactivation of HHV-8 in patients who had extensive and/or who had an advanced stage of the diseases. This intriguing observation prompted us to perform a retrospective study in which tested previous histopathology specimens of untreated patients with early stage MF for presence of (HHV-8) by Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) technology Objective: To investigate the presence of Human Herpesvirus-8 (HHV-8) in lesional skin of patients with early MF. Method: Retrospective study of the presence of HHV-8 in patients with early stages (1a,1b) MF. Fifty Paraffin–embedded lesional skin specimens were selected, 27 specimens were from patients with MF stage la and lb, 21 specimens from patients with psoriasis as negative control and 2 specimens from patients with Kaposi’s sarcoma as positive control. The presence of HHV-8 was analyzed from paraffin-embedded lesional tissue samples using a real time PCR technology. Results: A low association of HHV-8 infection in early stages of MF was observed. Only two samples were tested positive, while none tested positive in psoriatic samples. Conclusions: It may be concluded that HHV-8 is not significantly associated with early stages MF.