No more embarrassment. No more discomfort. No more excuses.
Empowering women’s health with Dr Jessica Hetherington from the Shepparton Women’s Health Centre.
Photo by
Drypsiak
For so many years women would dread the date that their two-yearly pap smear rolled around.
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They had to find the time to get to the doctor, and suffer through a speculum examination so that cervical cells could be collected and checked for abnormalities that could precede cervical cancer.
Since December 2017, the pap smear has been replaced with a much better test, known simply as a cervical screening test.
Rather than waiting for cervical cells to become abnormal, the new CST looked for the presence of human papillomavirus — the virus that was needed to cause the abnormalities in cervical cells.
Tests went from being two-yearly, to five-yearly, which was great for women.
Now, there is even better news for everyone with a cervix — self-collected cervical screening tests.
Doing your own test is as simple as seeing your GP, taking a swab to the bathroom to obtain a vaginal sample and returning it to the doctor. That’s it.
No more embarrassment. No more discomfort. No more excuses.
The vast majority of women will be eligible to have a self-collected sample and the vast majority of those will be HPV negative and will not need further testing.
So, if you: have a cervix, are between 25 and 74 years old, have ever been sexually active, have no symptoms that could indicate cervical cancer (such as bleeding after sex), had a normal screening test last time, and haven’t had a test in the past five years then you are eligible to do your own test.
How can self-testing possibly be as good as a sample taken by a clinician?
The evidence actually shows that the results are just as accurate either way. The self-test is looking for HPV in the vagina.
A clinician-collected sample looks for HPV from a cervical sample. If there is HPV present, it will be on the cervix and on the walls of the vagina. So, both tests are equally as good.
What happens if a CST comes back showing HPV?
When a CST comes back positive for HPV then further testing is required. This can be done automatically on a clinician-collected sample, but will require a more traditional speculum examination for those who initially completed a self-collected test.
Results of this further testing then guide ongoing management — a repeat test may be needed in a year, or in some cases, a referral to a gynaecologist for colposcopy may be required.
Overall, the option of self-collection for CST means fewer women miss out on testing. It means there are fewer reasons to put off getting tested.
It means fewer women suffering with cervical cancer and it means more lives saved. This is a really exciting update for women’s health.
