Cervical Screening Procedures Research Articles

Automatic Classification of Cervical Cells Using Deep Learning Methods

Cervical cancer, second only to breast cancer, is one of the cancers leading to cause death among women. Cervical cancer is a cancer that forms in the cells of the cervix, which is the lower section of the uterus that connects the uterus to the pelvis to the vaginal area. Various forms of the papilloma virus (HPV), a sexually transmitted infection that plays a role in cervical cancer and plays a critical part in most cases. The risk of cervical cancer developing can be reduced by undergoing screenings and receiving a vaccination that protects against HPV infection Cancer prevention is important. Most of the time, this is accomplished by checking the transformation zones. Cervical pre-cancerous stages can be observed in three different types, and all can transfigure into cancer. As a result, it's crucial to screen cervical anomalies sensibly and have a reliable process to determine if a cervix is normal (healthy) or pre-cancerous. Presently, the test being carried is a Pap smear test, commonly referred as a Pap test, which is a cervical screening procedure. It examines the cervix for the presence of pre - cancerous or cancerous cells. At present times deep learning is becoming more important alternative for cancer screening. A cervical cancer detection and classification system based on CNN has been proposed. Deep-learned features are acquired using the CNNs mode

Information needs among women taking part in primary HPV screening in England: a content analysis

ObjectivesIntroducing primary human papillomavirus (HPV) testing to cervical screening programmes means changes to the results women receive. We explored additional information needs among women undergoing HPV primary screening.DesignWomen were sent...

Influencing Reasons for Participation and Nonparticipation of Women in Cervical Screening

Introduction and background: Cervical cancer is one of the leading responsible condition for causinghigh death rate among women after breast cancer. It is preventable and curable disorder, but the prevalenceof cervical cancer remaining too high in India. Majority of women do not aware of cervical screeningprocedures. Maharashtra is standing in second position in possessing more number of cervical cancer cases.Methodology: A quasi- experimental pretest and post research design was used to execute the study. Thisstudy was conducted in selected hospitals of PCMC. The samples were the women age group between 30-60 years attending Gynec OPD. The systemic random sampling techniques was used to select the samples.Total sample size was 501. A self-administered tool was administered to find the reasons for participationand nonparticipation in cervical screening. Tool and content validity was done. The reliability of the toolwas done r value is = 0.88. The study proposal has been approved by the Ethical Committee, MGM Instituteof Health Sciences, Kamothe, Navi Mumbai. Permission has been taken from the concerned authority ofthe selected urban health care centers for data collection. The content was prepared on prevention and earlydetection of cervical screening in the form of video and modules in their regional languages.Results: Majority of participants among three experimental groups, about 38.32 % in verbal group, 41.91%in written group and 40.71 % in video group have responded that they could not take part in the cervicalscreening programme as they are very embarrassed with cervical screening procedure. While others hadresponded that, I am healthy I do not have to go for this test, some women said, I have only one sexualpartner so I don’t require this test. A few women have assumed that the test is very expensive, thinkingthat not required the Pap test as no symptoms of cancer observed and other have stated that don’t know thefrequency of test.Conclusion: A key strategy to improve the attendance of the women for cervical screening is to spread theawareness on prevention and early detection of cervical cancer by using various educational methods.

A Review of Computational Methods for Cervical Cells Segmentation and Abnormality Classification.

Cervical cancer is the one of the most common cancers in women worldwide, affecting around 570,000 new patients each year. Although there have been great improvements over the years, current screening procedures can still suffer from long and tedious workflows and ambiguities. The increasing interest in the development of computer-aided solutions for cervical cancer screening is to aid with these common practical difficulties, which are especially frequent in the low-income countries where most deaths caused by cervical cancer occur. In this review, an overview of the disease and its current screening procedures is firstly introduced. Furthermore, an in-depth analysis of the most relevant computational methods available on the literature for cervical cells analysis is presented. Particularly, this work focuses on topics related to automated quality assessment, segmentation and classification, including an extensive literature review and respective critical discussion. Since the major goal of this timely review is to support the development of new automated tools that can facilitate cervical screening procedures, this work also provides some considerations regarding the next generation of computer-aided diagnosis systems and future research directions.

Effect of Individual Counseling and Video Based Education on Prevention and Early Detection of Cervical Cancer and Participation of Women in Cervical Screening Procedures

Worldwide, cervical cancer is the second most common cause of cancer-related deaths and is responsible for approximately 250, 000 annual deaths, most of which occur in developing countries. The objective of this study was to assess the effect of individual counseling and video based education regarding prevention and early detection of cervical cancer and participation of women in cervical screening. Pre-experimental one group pretest and post test design was used. A structured interview questionnaire was administered. According to the researcher survey no participant has ever have got screened for cervical cancer. The t value for this test is 7.34 at 16 degrees of freedom, and the corresponding p-value of the test is extremely negligible (0.00000001). 70.58% of women from individual counseling, and 82.35% of women from video based education, have participated in cervical screening after attending our educational programmes.

Psychological distress associated with cancer screening: A systematic review.

Current national cancer screening recommendations include the potential risk of psychological harm related to screening. However, data on the relation of psychological distress to cancer screening is limited. The authors conducted a systematic review to assess psychological distress associated with cancer screening procedures. Studies that administered measures of psychological distress between 2 weeks before and 1 month after the screening procedure were included. In total, 22 eligible studies met criteria for review, including 13 observational trials and 9 randomized controlled trials. Eligible studies used a broad range of validated and unvalidated measures. Anxiety was the most commonly assessed construct and was measured using the State Trait Anxiety Inventory. Studies included breast, colorectal, prostate, lung, and cervical screening procedures. Distress was low across procedures, with the exception of colorectal screening. Distress did not vary according to the time at which distress was measured. None of the studies were conducted exclusively with the intention of assessing distress at the time of screening. Evidence of low distress during the time of cancer screening suggests that distress might not be a widespread barrier to screening among adults who undergo screening. However, more studies are needed using validated measures of distress to further understand the extent to which screening may elicit psychological distress and impede adherence to national screening recommendations. Cancer 2017;123:3882-94. © 2017 American Cancer Society.

Histopathological spectrum of cervical biopsies – a 5 year retrospective study

Introduction: cervix is a gateway to numerous non neoplastic and neoplastic gynecological lesions. Cervical cancer is the leading cancer in Indian women and second most common cancer in women worldwide next to breast cancer. Objectives: 1) To study the histopathological features of cervical lesions. 2) To study the age distribution and relative frequency of various cervical lesions. Materials and Methods: This is 5 years retrospective study of all cervical biopsies received from 2011-2015 in the department of pathology. Result: In a total of 739 cases studied 365(49.39%) cases were non neoplastic, 113(15.29%) were pre invasive and 261(35.31%) cases were malignant. Cervicitis was the most common non neoplastic lesion and squamous cell carcinoma was the most common cancer. Conclusion: Adequate cervical screening procedure with follow up cervical biopsies helps in early diagnosis and management of premalignant and malignant lesions.

Strategies for increasing uptake of cervical screening

Practice nurses can help get cervical screening back on the rise by understanding the reasons for non-attendance and then tailoring the primary care provision to encourage more women to have the test, writes Aine Kothari Cervical screening uptake is declining throughout the UK. A knowledge of the reasons for non-attendance can be used to tailor primary care provision of cervical screening to encourage women to respond to their screening invitation. Cervical screening saves lives by early detection and treatment of pre-cancerous abnormalities. The cervical screening procedure takes approximately 15 minutes and the result is generally available within two weeks of the test. This article discusses the barriers to attendance and the strategies that might be adopted to reverse the downward trend in screening uptake.

HPV Vaccine: How Far have We Achieved?

Globally, cervical cancer is the second most common cancer, and in India, it is the most common cancer in women. Human Papilloma virus (HPV) is the main cause of it. Although there are several methods for preventing cervical cancer, primary prevention by vaccination is the most effective option. HPV vaccine is safe and effective. It is expensive and is not a replacement for periodic cervical screening procedures. In developing countries, the cost effectiveness of vaccine and that of effective screening program with broader coverage is questionable. Today, HPV vaccine with regular cervical cancer screening program is the best possible tool to prevent cervical cancer.

Review of the current knowledge on the epidemiology, pathogenesis, and prevention of human papillomavirus infection

Human papillomavirus (HPV) infection is a central and necessary, although not sufficient, cause of cervical cancer. Besides HPV, the additional multiple risk factors related with the onset of cervical cancer are early-age sexual activities; high number of sexual partners, which is the most salient risk factor; suppression and alteration of the immune status; long-term use of oral contraceptives; and other hormonal influences. The tumor-suppressor proteins p53 and pRb are degraded and destabilized through ubiquitination by viral oncoproteins E6 and E7. Over 95% of cervical cancer cases worldwide test positive for oncogenic HPV DNA. Although cervical screening procedures have been successful in reducing the disease burden associated with HPV infection because of lack of resources or inadequate infrastructure many countries have failed to reduce cervical cancer mortality. Therefore, prevention may be a valuable strategy for reducing the economic and disease burden of HPV infection. At present, two successful prophylactic HPV vaccines are available, quadrivalent (HPV16/18/6/11) 'Gardasil' and bivalent (HPV16/18) 'Cervarix' for vaccinating young adolescent girls at or before the onset of puberty. Recent data indicate that vaccination prevents the development of cervical lesions in women who have not already acquired the vaccine-specific HPV types. Moreover, several therapeutic vaccines that are protein/peptide-based, DNA-based, or cell-based are in clinical trials but are yet to establish their efficacy; these vaccines are likely to provide important future health benefits. The therapeutic vaccination mode of prevention is a promising area of research, as revealed in preclinical trials; however, clinical trials based on large populations are warranted before reaching a valid conclusion. This review summarizes the studies on the epidemiology of HPV infection, the pathogenesis of viral oncoproteins in the oncogenesis of cervical cancer, the economic and health burden of HPV-related diseases, and, finally, focuses on the results of recent clinical vaccination trials.

How Sexual History and Knowledge of Cervical Cancer and Screening Influence Chinese Women's Screening Behavior in Mainland China

Accurate information and knowledge about cervical cancer and screening importantly influence women's cervical screening participation. Sexual behavior plays a crucial role in human papillomavirus transmission and the subsequent development of cervical cancer. Indeed, the uptake of cervical screening among Chinese women is relatively low compared with other populations. To understand women's attendance pattern of cervical screening, knowledge about cervical cancer and screening, and factors influencing their utilization of cervical screening in mainland China. A cross-sectional survey was conducted to collect women's participation pattern for cervical screening, knowledge about cervical cancer and screening, sociodemographic information and sexual history, and barriers to participating in cervical screening. Married women and women who had had their first intercourse after the age of 21 years were significantly more likely to participate in screening. Screened women demonstrated a higher level of knowledge about the cervical screening procedure compared with nonscreened women (P = .002). Also, the scores of individual items such as women's knowledge of cervical screening and risk factors were significantly different between the 2 groups. The current system of free physical examinations for women in mainland China is a major motivator for women's utilization of cervical screening services. Chinese women's marital status and sexual history influence their screening behavior. Unmarried women who have ever had sex should be encouraged to have cervical screening, and consistent and appropriate information about the preventive nature of cervical screening and risk factors associated with cervical cancer should be provided to the general public.

Reducing the Health Burden of HPV Infection Through Vaccination

Human papillomavirus (HPV), a sexually transmitted infection and the etiologic cause of genital warts and cervical cancer, is highly prevalent in sexually active men and women. Although cervical screening procedures have significantly reduced the disease burden associated with HPV infection, they are expensive and abnormal results cause significant emotional distress. Therefore, prevention may be an effective strategy for reducing the economic, psychosocial, and disease burden of HPV infection. Multivalent vaccines are now in clinical development. A bivalent vaccine that protects against HPV 16 and 18, and a quadrivalent vaccine which protects against HPV types 6, 11, 16, and 18, have been shown to significantly reduce the occurrence of incident and persistent HPV infections in phase 2 clinical trials; phase 3 trials are currently underway. HPV vaccines will be most effective when administered prior to initiation of sexual activity, and vaccination campaigns should aggressively target preadolescent and adolescent populations.

Cytology and Cervicography Compared to Cytology Alone for Human Papillomavirus Detection

This retrospective study compared cervicography and cytology versus cytologic screening alone for the detection of cervical and vaginal human papillomavirus (HPV) infections. Six hundred seventy-three patients were evaluated by both Pap smears and cervicography. Eighteen of 673 Pap smears showed evidence of HPV, a 2.7% incidence of HPV detected by Pap smear. Two hundred ninety-two patients were referred for colposcopic examination because of suspicious cervigrams. One hundred one of the colposcoped patients underwent colposcopically directed biopsy. The cervigram was interpreted as positive for HPV in 45 of these patients. Fifty-two (51%) of the 101 patients biopsied had histologic evidence of an HPV infection. Only 8 (15%) of these 52 patients with biopsy-proven HPV had evidence of HPV on their Pap smears. Nearly three times as many patients were found to have HPV by cervigram as by Pap smears (McNemar's test, P < 0.001). The addition of cervicography to the cervical screening procedure increased the HPV detection rate to 7.7% (52/673). It is our conclusion that cervicography may be a useful additional screening technique for the detection of patients at increased risk for cervical HPV infections.