Report: Push Back Age of Cervical Cancer Tests

Friday, November 20, 2009

This article found on Fox news Fox news is about new guidelines for cervical cancer screening. The new guidelines are for women to start getting Pap smears at the age of 21 years old and then they do not need annual screening after that. These guidelines are put out by the reputable American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) and is intended to benefit women by eliminating the need for certain procedures that now are seen as needless. The guidelines go on to say "Women younger than 30 should undergo cervical cancer screening once every two years instead of an annual exam. And those age 30 and older can be screened once every three years."


Amazing how if you don't go to the doctor, they won't do anything to you isn't it? I do find that doctors seem to want to perform things that will be compensated for such as testing and procedures albeit benign, but in the best interest of screening for health concerns. However if the 'shoe doesn't fit' they can't wear it anymore and this is how I acquaint this new evidence, which indicates early treatment of abnormal Pap smears is actually causing problems later in life with pregnancy and preterm deliveries as reported by the chairman of the ACOG in this article.


I like the way the author of this article brought up the recent change in breast cancer screening guidelines, in comparison to the guidelines put out by the ACOG on cervical screening. Apparently the American Cancer Society did not like whoever put out the breast cancer screening information from the quote in the article by the deputy chief medical officer, he said "The guidelines …. were largely based on computer projections." showing that it is necessary to make changes in medicine only on evidenced based science. This article included the reason that causes cervical cancers in a very nonjudgmental way, which I thought, was pretty decent. It involves a sexually transmitted disease called HPV. One medical expert explained "Women do not get cervical cancer first. They acquire HPV, the sexually transmitted virus that causes precancerous abnormalities of the cervix and cervical cancer. It takes years to progress from an HPV-infection to full-blown cervical cancer." So really nothing has changed about getting Pap smears. It sounds like women can start at any age or get screened as often as a woman wants, except what has changed is there will not be any more "Overdiagnosing and overtreating adolescents and very young women" as stated by another medical expert.


Though I'm involved in health care. I am also a healthcare consumer and have a bit of skepticism when new information is put out to follow as best advice. I think the author for this article reported fairly, with ethical bias on the relevancy of this information. This was achieved by the use of competent sources and melding of different types of information in common with the topic of cervical screening such as the HPV information. Bottom line, I found this news story credible and helpful.