Preliminary Evaluation of the Value of a Small-Molecule Probe Targeting DNMT1 in Detecting the Methylation of PAX1 in Cervical Cancer

Background: To investigate the screening value of a small-molecule probe to assess the methylation of PAX1 in cervical cancer. Materials and Methods: The diagnostic threshold of the grayscale values for cervical lesions was assessed by plotting the Receiver Operating Characteristic (ROC) curve of subjects. Grayscale values were significantly different among the four groups (p < 0.05). Compared with the LSIL and cervicitis groups, a considerably higher grayscale value was found in the CA and high-grade squamous intraepithelial lesion (HSIL) groups (both p < 0.05). Results: The differential ROC curves of the grayscale values showed that the diagnostic Area Under Curve of the probe for cervicitis and low-grade squamous intraepithelial lesion (LSIL) was 0.8724 (95% CI = 0.7762-0.9685, p < 0.0001), for cervicitis and CA was 1.0000 (p < 0.0001), for the LSIL and HSIL was 0.5484 (95% CI = 0.3826-0.7142, p = 0.5755), and for the LSIL and CA was 0.7724 (95% CI = 0.6016-0.9432, p = 0.0138). Conclusion: The small molecular probe has certain application value in differentiating the type of cervical lesions and has better efficacy in distinguishing cervical inflammatory and precancerous lesions from carcinogenesis, but less efficacy in determining the type of precancerous lesions.