A retrospective study on cervical cancer screening- In a newly opened tertiary care Centre in Eastern India

Abstract

: One of the most prevalent cancers, cervical cancer is also the leading cause of mortality for women in underdeveloped nations. A fundamental test for finding infections and precancerous diseases is the Papanicolaou smear. This study aims to comprehend the function of cervical screening in detecting premalignant, malignant, and non-neoplastic lesions as well as the prevalence of different lesions in women who received a traditional pap smear technique. We screened women in the age group of 15-70 years who attended the Outpatient department of the Obstetrics and Gynaecology department of AIIMS, Kalyani. All women who gave consent for screening by Pap smear test were included. Of 2133 cases, most of the cases were benign comprising of Negative for Intraepithelial Lesion or malignancy (NILM) of about 1989 (93.24%) cases, 705 (33.05%) inflammatory. Atypical squamous cells of undetermined significance in 44 cases (2.06%), Atypical squamous cells cannot exclude HSIL in 3 (0.14%), low-grade squamous intraepithelial lesion (LSIL) in 11 (0.52%), high-grade squamous intraepithelial lesion (HSIL) in 5 (0.23%) women and Atypical glandular cell in 7 (0.33%). Out of 202 asymptomatic women (9.47%), 12 cases (0.56%) showed epithelial cell abnormality (8 ASCUS, 2 LSIL, 1 ASCH, 1HSIL) (Odds ratio=0.5056, Significance level, P=0.0362). Conventional Pap smear test is a very easy and cheap diagnostic tool to detect premalignant, malignant, and non-neoplastic lesions and the prevalence of various lesions.  As per the American Cancer Society (ACS), a pap smear should start from 25 years to be done till 65 years (repeated after every 3 years).