To remind you to look after your cervix (cervices?!)

[FourForYouGlenCoco]

I know it's been done plenty of times, but one more won't hurt, right?
So long story short:
Went for (overdue) first smear last year, after DC2 was born. Borderline changes & HPV - sent for colposcopy, they went for 'watch and wait' and asked me to come back in 6 months.
Went back, severe dyskaryosis/CIN III. Back again a few weeks later for lletz under local.

The hospital is an hour+ away. The logistics of it all, organising someone to take DC1 to/from school, trekking baby DC2 back and forth with me - not fun. But I am so so relieved I didn't put it off, so relieved I didn't just assume everything would be alright. In the 6 months between colposcopies, cell changes happened really fast. If I'd left it...who knows?
The lletz was really not that bad either - I was very apprehensive beforehand but it was maybe 5 minutes and done. Minimal pain, minimal bleeding afterwards, and definitely a damn sight better than cervical cancer.

So please, please, PLEASE book your smear if it's due or overdue. Go to your appt, don't bury your head in the sand, don't put it off. I know it's not how you'd choose to spend an hour, but it's really not that bad. And it's so fucking important. So do it.

Also, to spell it out, having a smear can be bad for your health. And the lower risk you are otherwise for cervical cancer, the more the balance is tipped towards risk and away from benefit.

Women shouldn't have smear tests is that what you're saying?

Its a risk to their health.

Prove it to shut me up show me the evidence.

Every woman is entitled to make their own choice.
Like DyingToLive I never missed a smear but a couple of years ago was diagnosed with stage 3 CC. I've been in remission for two years but am now having tests for a possible recurrence.
The op is not BU in reminding people but ultimately everyone will decide for themselves.
*DyingToLive• big hugs and

My mum is 92 she's never had a mammogram in her life - with all due respect, I just don't understand why that means you haven't?

Then they should be struck of you have to give them permission to do that. You cant allow doctors to bully you find another doctor and report them.

They should indeed horridhenry, but that doesn't answer the question of whether the women concerned were coerced, does it? And honestly, how do you expect women who've been subjected to smears without consent when having other gynae procedures to know the difference? They might have been anaesthetised at the time!

This is the problem with putting the responsibility onto the patient. The responsibility lies with the provider, the one with power in that situation. If women have experienced being struck off because they won't have a smear, for example, it's not the fault of the woman for not preventing it. You are getting dangerously close to victim blaming here. You need to understand that CLINICIANS bear the responsibility for ensuring there is informed consent from patients. Nothing should be happening if there's not.

Horrid, are you being deliberately simplistic, or are you just a case of nominative determinism?

This article that has already been posted outlines the risks: www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families/features/why-im-saying-no-to-a-smear-7577967.html Huge numbers of women have to be screened, and 50 women will have to have invasive procedures to their cervixes, to prevent one death from cervical cancer. Some of those women who didn't and wouldn't have developed cervical cancer, but did have their cervixes damaged, will have bleeds, infections, premature births, perhaps late miscarriages.

Posters on this thread have already described the negative consequences they experienced from smear tests.

My mum has had both breast and cervical cancer both caught early via screening and both cured . She has been cancer free for over 10 years. Without creeping she would probably be dead by now.
Colon screening is not offered until aged 60. My husband is 59 and is in the final stages of colon cancer with mets to his lungs, liver and bones. Screening is far to late for him and should be offered at 50. So why would anyone not accept screening if available? I can promise you dieing from curable cancers is a lot more upsetting than a doing a simple over in 5 minutes medical procedure.

If women have experienced being struck off because they won't have a smear, for example, it's not the fault of the woman for not preventing it. You are getting dangerously close to victim blaming here.

I meant the clinician/doctor/nurse should be struck of not the patient. The patient has to give permission and if they do it against their will then they have to complain so it won't happen to someone else.

MissBax breast cancer is familial, in that it runs in families where mothers have had breast cancer and aunts too (close female relatives and not aunts by your father) the familial line is also seen in certain races. Obviously there is the identification of the BRCA gene, which gives those identified an above 85% chance of getting either ovarian, breast or both cancers. Now given that statistic, I would be getting every test going, plus surgery, but I do know someone who did this and still has ended up with breast cancer.

There is no evidence to date to suggest that cervical cancer has this familial line. There is evidence to suggest that heterosexual activity causes cervical cancer. There was a study done in nuns to discount this. However, the incidence in nuns was so low that it was suggested that nuns did indeed engage in sexual activity before being a nun or whilst being a nun.

MissBax breast cancer is familial - this is the most bizarre statement ever! It's not SOLELY familial. Yes it can be, but it also can not be. Saying your mum didn't have breast cancer isn't really why people shouldn't get mammograms 😕
Obviously it's your choice, but I wouldn't go about saying that as you could put someone off getting checked if they simply think it's familial.
I know 4 women who have / have had breast cancer and none of their mothers did.

"A small number of people have an increased risk of breast cancer because of their family history. However, most breast cancers are not inherited..."

• Breast Cancer Care UK

And it causes cervical cancer the younger the female is engaged in it on a regular basis (at least 3 times a week from the age of onset puberty), though not in every female who engages in such activity.

That's not to victim blame. It's just the way in which stats work. Someone could, for example, have sex once at 18 and still get hit by the virus, even with protection.

Cervical cancer is extremely rare amongst gay women who assert their sexuality from early teenage.

Elendon - i was not referring to the vaccine, i thought we were talking about pap smears as a screening for cervical cell abnormality. I myself opted not to get the vaccine, although hindsight shows I may have benefited as I did get the high risk strain.

I was referring to the assertion that as a gay woman, your DD could not get the HPV virus (unless i read your post wrong, sorry if that's the case). HPV is the virus which is the usual cause of cervical cell abnormalities and can be spread by means other than penis in vagina sex, and I do also believe the literature makes it clear even condoms are not foolproof in those situations.

Relevant section here:
Both men and women can spread the virus to others whether or not they have any symptoms. Lesbians and bisexual women can transmit HPV through direct genital skin-to-skin contact, touching, or sex toys used with other women. Lesbians who have had sex with men are also at risk of HPV infection. This is why regular Pap tests are just as important for lesbian and bisexual women as they are for heterosexual women.

Unless your DD can be 100% sure her partners are all virgins and/or have never had any sexual contact with others who may have been exposed to HPV or never has any kind of sexual activity as described above, she cannot be certain she will never be exposed to HPV.

Of course it is her choice whether to get a PAP smear or not, that's never in question.

Show me the figures!

Please do not cite pre cancerous breast cancer cells, which like pre cancerous cervical cells almost always resolve themselves.

If every 40 year old man went for prostate cancer exam and blood test at least 50% of them would have an abnormality. By the time most men are dead in the average age range, if everyone of them were tested for prostate cancer, all of them would have an abnormality.

I meant the clinician/doctor/nurse should be struck of not the patient. The patient has to give permission and if they do it against their will then they have to complain so it won't happen to someone else.

The clinician should absolutely be struck off but again, this doesn't answer the question of whether you still think no women are being forced? And again, how do you expect women who don't know they had smears performed without consent to complain.

You don't seem to realise that some forms of coercion won't leave the victim knowing they actually can do anything about it. So eg a woman who's not been told she doesn't have to do it, and so goes for her smear in the belief it's not optional, how would she even realise she can complain? I would encourage you to reflect on your views about women not being forced.

The fault here lies with clinicians who don't obtain proper consent, not with the women who it happens to. The only way to ensure there is always informed consent is for practices like those I described to end, and that's only in the control of the doctors and nurses. Nobody else.

Posters on this thread have already described the negative consequences they experienced from smear tests.

I have read Dyings post and its really sad you do the right get regular checks, then suddenly you get cursed with it. That is fucked up. I wouldn't want to take a chance and not have it done, you never know.

A lot of women on here have said that if they never went to there smear appointment who knows what would have happened if they left it another year.

What procedure is 100%, not even contraception is 100% they say 99.9% protected from pregnancy. It all comes with risks as well but it doesn't mean I am not going to get checked.

Cantspell, I am very sorry for what you're going through with your husband, and I hope he is receiving excellent palliative care. I don't want to debate or disagree with you personally, as I'm sure you have enough on your plate.

That said, I would like to say something more broadly to others reading who are interested. I think this thread amply outlines some of the reasons why people can make perfectly logical, reasoned choices to decline screening. We'd all like to live in a world where screening picked up all cases of cancer early and had no side-effects or disadvantages. Unfortunately, we just don't - and the NHS does acknowledge this by not offering routine screening in populations where evidence shows that it does more harm than good. That is why it doesn't offer bowel cancer screening to under-60s, or mammograms to under-50s, or smears to under-25s - because they would be hurting more people than they helped.

And screening still hurts many people in these populations. Overtreatment and unnecessary treatment is a serious problem in medicine. The problem with screening is that we don't have a good way of finding out which screenings were actually false positives on the individual level. Nobody who has unnecessary intervention thinks, "I had to have a cervical biopsy which caused my daughter to be born prematurely and I never DID develop cancer, how shit". They think, "Thank God it wasn't cancer, isn't screening wonderful" - when in fact it's quite likely they'd have been better off never going for screening at all.

All of this is no longer relevant if you find a lump in your breast or carry the BRCA2 gene mutation linked with cancer or experience other worrying symptoms. Then a doctor will be more than happy to run tests, no matter what age you are. But if you don't have any symptoms of cancer, it's perfectly reasonable to decide that for you personally, routine screening is not something you want.

I got invited for my first smear just before I turned 20 (in Scotland) but put it off again and again.. then moved to England aged 23 so was under the age guidelines here. Kept avoiding it until finally biting the bullet and going for my first one ever in January, aged 27. I was an absolute mess, went to pieces and sobbed my eyes out to the (fantastic) nurse - she finally calmed me down and did it- and I was like 'is that it?!' She sent me off with a big cuddle and 2 weeks later I got my letter through - all clear.

I could kick myself when I think of all the years I put it off because I was just so terrified - I was so very lucky that nothing had gone on those years that I had missed! I will never take it for granted again and I do hope that others who have been putting it off can believe me when I say it's in no way as bad as you think!

i also find the difference in attitude to pap smears on MN (perhaps a UK thing?) interesting. In north america, so far my experience has been that it's generally an accepted norm that once you become sexually active you start getting regular checks (not just US where private healthcare is profit based, but also in Canada). the guidelines have (finally) recently been updated to every few years as opposed to annual as long as you have no history of abnormal results.

i've never even heard of anyone over here saying they're scared of a pap, or terrified, or afraid of the pain or any of those sorts of reasons not to get one - paps are just such a norm my experience is that no one worries about getting it done, they just do it.

The clinician should absolutely be struck off but again, this doesn't answer the question of whether you still think no women are being forced? And again, how do you expect women who don't know they had smears performed without consent to complain.

I have never heard of women being forced until now. Where did you get this from anyway women not knowing they had smears. Did they see it in their medical notes or did they receive a letter. The clinician has to send it of.

Screening is not exact - it is a matter of balancing the risks with the benefits. For the general population of women, the risks of screening are outweighed by the benefits, so a screening programme is worth doing.

However, an individual woman's risk/benefit analysis is not the same as the average of the population. Some will be at a much higher risk and some at a much lower, and many of them will not be able to work out their risk. It is up to them to work this out for themselves and decide whether they wish to take up the invitation. You can decide this for yourself as it is an invitation, not a summons.

If you do not take up your invitation, then you will receive two reminders, then your doctor will be sent information that you are a 'non responder' which will go on your notes. You will then be called up in 3 year's time. There is not actually a way to decline this 'invitation' as it is sent out by the company that does all the administration and not your doctor, so this will happen whether you tell your doctor you do not want it or not. Your doctor may wish to increase income/statistics for this procedure and ask you to have it when you come in for something else, although this is not considered good practice.

The only way to stop this is to inform your surgery that you wish to be taken off the list. You will still count in their statistics as being of the right age and not screened. They should send you a letter and you should sign it and say that you have read the NHS leaflet (this contains the bare minimum of information to make your choice though - there is much more to find out). Then the will stop you being called up.

You can then go in and request screening at any time as long as it is more than 3 years (or 5 years over 50) since your last screening, should you change your mind for whatever reason.

For those above saying that bowel screening is not available until 60, well there is now a screening test (bowel scope screening - like a mini colonoscopy) which you can be called up for as a one off at 55. You can take up the offer any time up to age 60, when you start the poo tests.

Lesbians who have had sex with men are not lesbians/gay but bisexual. Just like gay men who have sex with women are not gay but bisexual.

If a lesbian has ever had sex with a man then she isn't really a lesbian? Or have I misunderstood what you meant?

Elendon - don't be ridiculous. Lots of lesbians have had hetero relationships in the past. The same with gay men

Every smear test I have had I have received a letter with the results. One is sent to me and another to my doctor.