Inconclusive Pap Smear?
Inconclusive Pap Smear?
Jan. 16, 2002 -- Most women know that having an annual Pap smear is the best way to catch cervical cancer while it is still highly treatable, but what should you do when the results come back inconclusive? Roughly 2 million women and their doctors face that question each year, and the answer is far from simple.
While some doctors take a watch-and-wait approach to inconclusive Pap tests, others recommend an expensive, and sometimes painful, diagnostic procedure known as a colposcopy. Now, new research from the National Cancer Institute (NCI) confirms that performing a simple viral test is a useful third approach.
Last year, NCI researchers reported that testing women with inconclusive smears for the human papillomavirus (HPV) -- the sexually-transmitted virus that causes genital warts -- could help identify those who did not have cervical cancer or precancerous cells. That study found that a negative HPV test indicated with 99% certainty that a woman did not have cervical cancer. New research, reported in the Jan. 16 issue of the Journal of the National Cancer Institute, suggests that the test is highly sensitive for all women, no matter what their age.
Human papillomavirus is now recognized as the cause of essentially all cervical cancers, so a negative HPV test is proof that a woman does not have the disease. With this in mind, one of the nation's largest women's health organizations now recommends that all women with inconclusive Pap smears receive HPV testing.
"We don't want to interfere with anyone's relationship with their doctor, but we know that there are still many physicians out there who are not routinely offering HPV testing to these patients," says gynecologist Angel Houghton, MD, who chairs the American Medical Women's Association's national HPV and cervical cancer campaign.
"We want women to know that this is an option. What I have seen in my community is that women are simply told to repeat their Pap smear every four to six months until they have three that are normal. That means it takes a year to a year-and-a-half to know that everything is OK. For many women that is emotionally unacceptable."
Inconclusive Pap Smear?
Jan. 16, 2002 -- Most women know that having an annual Pap smear is the best way to catch cervical cancer while it is still highly treatable, but what should you do when the results come back inconclusive? Roughly 2 million women and their doctors face that question each year, and the answer is far from simple.
While some doctors take a watch-and-wait approach to inconclusive Pap tests, others recommend an expensive, and sometimes painful, diagnostic procedure known as a colposcopy. Now, new research from the National Cancer Institute (NCI) confirms that performing a simple viral test is a useful third approach.
Last year, NCI researchers reported that testing women with inconclusive smears for the human papillomavirus (HPV) -- the sexually-transmitted virus that causes genital warts -- could help identify those who did not have cervical cancer or precancerous cells. That study found that a negative HPV test indicated with 99% certainty that a woman did not have cervical cancer. New research, reported in the Jan. 16 issue of the Journal of the National Cancer Institute, suggests that the test is highly sensitive for all women, no matter what their age.
Human papillomavirus is now recognized as the cause of essentially all cervical cancers, so a negative HPV test is proof that a woman does not have the disease. With this in mind, one of the nation's largest women's health organizations now recommends that all women with inconclusive Pap smears receive HPV testing.
"We don't want to interfere with anyone's relationship with their doctor, but we know that there are still many physicians out there who are not routinely offering HPV testing to these patients," says gynecologist Angel Houghton, MD, who chairs the American Medical Women's Association's national HPV and cervical cancer campaign.
"We want women to know that this is an option. What I have seen in my community is that women are simply told to repeat their Pap smear every four to six months until they have three that are normal. That means it takes a year to a year-and-a-half to know that everything is OK. For many women that is emotionally unacceptable."
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