Visual Inspection Using Acetic Acid (VIA) and Pap’s Smear as Methods of Cervical Cancer Screening: An Experience of Dhaka Medical College Hospital, Dhaka, Bangladesh

Abstract

Background: National screening programme for cervical cancer has been running in Bangladesh since 2004 through visual inspection using acetic acid (VIA). However, Pap’s smear is also used for the same, where it is available.Objectives: To see the effectiveness of VIA and Pap’s Smear as cervical cancer screening methods.Methods: This prospective study was done on 600 women who attended the outpatient gynaecology clinic and cervical cancer screening programme underwent both VIA and Pap’s smear cytology. Histopathology was taken as gold standard to compare the performance of VIA and cytology (Pap’s smear). Hence, positive cases were further subjected to colposcopy directed biopsy. Then the sensitivity and specificity of VIA and Pap’s smear were compared. The study was done in Dhaka Medical College Hospital, Dhaka, between July and December 2012.Results: On VIA, 46 had aceto-white lesions and on Pap’s smear, 28 had atypical squamous cells of undetermined significance (ASCUS) or worse lesions out of 600 women screened. 22 were positive on both VIA and cytology; 24 were positive on VIA only; and 6 were positive on cytology only. Histological diagnosis of CIN/carcinoma cervix was found in 36 positive cases, who underwent biopsy (n=52). Among them, 20 were picked up from Pap’s smear positive cases, whereas, 34 were VIA positive cases. VIA was found more sensitive (94.44%) than Pap’s smear (55.55%), which was statistically significant (p<0.001). However, the specificity of VIA was slightly lower (97.87%) than that of cytology (98.58%). Positive predictive value (PPV) of VIA was 73.91% for VIA and 71.42% for Pap’s smear, while Negative Predictive Value (NPV) were 9.63% and 97.2% respectively.Conclusion: VIA has got much more sensitivity and slightly lower specificity than that of Pap’s smear in cervical cancer screening.International Journal of Human and Health Sciences Vol. 04 No. 03 July’20 Page : 189-193