Potential impact of human papillomavirus vaccines on public STD clinic workloads and on opportunities to diagnose and treat other sexually transmitted diseases

• Published in: Sexually transmitted diseases Vol. 34; no. 7; p. 503
• Main Authors: Dempsey, Amanda F, Koutsky, Laura A, Golden, Matthew
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States 01.07.2007
• Subjects: Adolescent; Adult; Aged; Aged, 80 and over; Ambulatory Care Facilities - utilization; Child; Cross-Sectional Studies; Female; Humans; Male; Middle Aged; Papillomavirus Infections - diagnosis; Papillomavirus Infections - prevention & control; Papillomavirus Infections - therapy; Papillomavirus Vaccines - therapeutic use; Prevalence; Retrospective Studies; Sexually Transmitted Diseases - diagnosis; Sexually Transmitted Diseases - epidemiology; Washington - epidemiology; Workload; Washington
• ISSN: 0148-5717
• DOI: 10.1097/01.olq.0000253337.62932.29

Eradicating genital warts through HPV immunization could decrease STD clinic utilization but may result in missed opportunities to diagnose other STDs. To define the proportion of STD clinic visits attributable to HPV and to describe the prevalence of other STD diagnoses among visits for HPV-related presenting concerns. Cross-sectional analysis of medical records (1994-2004) from a single STD clinic. Prevalences of STDs were calculated for male and female patients with and without HPV-related presenting concerns. Of the 66,537 visits included in the study, 10.3% were HPV-related. Of the 3085 HPV-related "new problem" visits, only 281 non-HPV diagnoses were made, with nonspecific urethritis and CT being the most common diagnosis for males and females, respectively. Nearly 25% of the 14,574 follow-up visits were for HPV. Newly developed HPV vaccines may substantially decrease public STD clinic workloads with little associated lost opportunity to diagnose and treat other STDs.