Where do you go for smear tests ?

[Pancakeflipper]

Does your sexual health clinic do smear tests ?

I'm genuinely surprised to find out ours doesn't. There's no choice except my GP and I ain't going there (again).

The cell sample is tested for HPV. But they also do a visual check, which is how they found I had a cervical polyp - I'd had no symptoms.

(I do go to the nurse at my GP though.)

You are only invited to smears up to 64. They won't do one unless you have symptoms. That's one reason the online tests are good. Mamagrams you can still book them yourself when the routine ones stop.

If the at home ones are now available, surely these should be offered, because many people would choose these (because they're busy/feel uncomfortable going to the GP etc)

I thought the at-home tests were being rolled out this year.

I did one via Daye.

We don’t do smears for symptoms. If not due, the lab would bin the sample.
If you are over 65 and never had one you can, never had one since aged 50 you can, and you last two previous smears havent been negative regardless of age, you can.

GP surgery only, miles from sexual health clinics and whilst now had 3 I don’t want anymore in respect of how a fibroid was treated.

a smear nurse failed to read notes in Feb 2024 and argued I’d had a coil in (weeks before I ever had)

GP surgery (nurse) it would never have occurred to me to try anywhere else TBH.

GP surgery, conducted by a nurse.

So if they only test for hpv, if it comes back positive do you have to go back and have a second test done for abnormal cells?

No, they test the cells collected - HPV is not found, they're thrown away untested. It can lead to follow-up scans, and at the very least, an annual recall, which is what is currently happening with me, rather than going to a 5 year gap as would normally happen at my age.

In my 20's I used to get smears done either by the GP or by the family planning clinic doctor. I did find the metal speculums to be better than the current plastic ones they use.

In the last 10 to 15 years though the nurse at the GP surgery does them now. I'm not sure if other clinics do them.

@EBearhugah I see, thanks for clarifying, just had a text from my surgery the other day saying I’m due for a test, if only someone could invent an alternative to the dreaded speculum! No matter how hard I tell myself to relax it always feels painful