Does lowering the screening age for cervical cancer in The Netherlands make sense?

Epidemiology of Cervical Cancer in the Caribbean

Cervical cancer (CvC) is considered a preventable disease; however, in the Caribbean, it is still one of the fourth most common causes of death in women. Efforts to overcome obstacles to the treatment and control of this preventable disease are being made by several countries within the Caribbean. However, no health issue can be readily managed without first acquiring an understanding of the dynamics relating to its severity of impact reaching the target population, its clinical pathology, and the availability of treatment and/or preventative measures to control or halt its progression. To assess the status of CvC in the Caribbean, a review of the literature was conducted using PubMed. The Caribbean was defined in the review as comprising nations and islands whose coastlines are touched by the Caribbean Sea. This led to an assessment of the available literature on CvC for 33 Caribbean territories. The review showed a lack of published information on CvC and highlights the need for greater research. This also serves as a template for subsequent investigations.

Screening for persistent high-risk HPV infections may be a valuable screening method for young women; A retrospective cohort study

Introduction

Screening of young women is often discouraged because of the high risk of unnecessary diagnostics or overtreatment. Multiple countries therefore use cytology instead of high risk human papillomavirus (hrHPV)-testing as screening method for young women because of the limited specificity of hrHPV-testing. The objective of this study was to investigate how hrHPV screening before the age of 30, can be used to reduce the future prevalence of high-grade cervical lesions in young women.

Methods

We retrospectively analyzed follow-up data from a cohort study on HPV prevalence in unscreened Dutch women aged 18–29 years. Women performed multiple self-collected cervico-vaginal samples for HPV detection and genotyping. At least one valid cervical pathology result was obtained from 1,018 women. Women were categorized as hrHPV negative, cleared- or persistent hrHPV infection. Anonymized follow-up data for each group was obtained. Composite outcome measures were defined as; normal, low-grade squamous intraepithelial lesion (LSIL) or high-grade squamous intraepithelial lesion (HSIL). The association between prior hrHPV status and cytology and histology outcome was analyzed.

Results

After exclusion, a pathology result was registered for 962 women. The prevalence of HSIL was 19.3% in women with a persistent HPV infection at a younger age. This is significantly higher (p<0,001) compared with the HSIL prevalence of 1.5% in HPV-negative women, and 3.1% (n = 8) in women who cleared the hrHPV infection in the past.

Conclusion

Women with a persistent hrHPV infection in their 20s, show an increased prevalence of HSIL lesions in their early 30s. Screening for persistent hrHPV infections, instead of cytology screening before the age of 30, can be used to reduce the future prevalence of cervical cancer in young women.

The challenges of organising cervical screening programmes in the 15 old member states of the European Union

Cervical cancer incidence and mortality can be reduced substantially by organised cytological screening at 3 to 5 year intervals, as was demonstrated in the Nordic countries, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands and parts of Italy. Opportunistic screening, often proposed at yearly schedules, has also reduced the burden of cervical cancer in some, but not all, of the other old member states (belonging to the European Union since 1995) but at a cost that is several times greater. Well organised screening programmes have the potential to achieve greater participation of the target population at regular intervals, equity of access and high quality. Despite the consistent evidence that organised screening is more efficient than non-organised screening, and in spite of the Cancer Screening Recommendations of the European Council, health authorities of eight old member states (Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, Greece, Luxembourg, Portugal and Spain) have not yet started national organised implementation of screening for cervical cancer. A decision was made by the Irish government to extend their pilot programme nationally while new regional programmes commenced in Portugal and Spain. Introduction of new methods of prevention, such as HPV screening and prophylactic HPV vaccination, can reduce the burden further, but this will require a high level of organisation with particular attention needed for the maximisation of population coverage, compliance with evidence-based guidelines, monitoring of data enabling continued evaluation and improvement of the preventive programmes.

Incidence of cervical cancer after several negative smear results by age 50: prospective observational study

OBJECTIVE

To determine the incidence of cervical cancer after several negative cervical smear tests at different ages.

DESIGN

Prospective observational study of incidence of cervical cancer after the third consecutive negative result based on individual level data in a national registry of histopathology and cytopathology (PALGA).

SETTING

Netherlands, national data. Population 218,847 women aged 45-54 and 445,382 aged 30-44 at the time of the third negative smear test.

MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES

10 year cumulative incidence of interval cervical cancer.

RESULTS

105 women developed cervical cancer within 2 595,964 woman years at risk after the third negative result at age 30-44 and 42 within 1,278,532 woman years at risk after age 45-54. During follow-up, both age groups had similar levels of screening. After 10 years of follow-up, the cumulative incidence rate of cervical cancer was similar: 41/100,000 (95% confidence interval 33 to 51) in the younger group and 36/100,000 (24 to 52) in the older group (P=0.48). The cumulative incidence rate of cervical intraepithelial neoplasia grade I+ was twice as high in the younger than in the older group (P<0.001).

CONCLUSIONS

The risk for cervical cancer after several negative smear results by age 50 is similar to the risk at younger ages. Even after several negative smear results, age is not a good discriminative factor for early cessation of cervical cancer screening.