Smear tests should not refer to women says study

[flyingbuttress43]

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/05/18/dont-mention-women-smear-test-invitations-might-make-trans/

Apologies if this has been posted but I can't see it.

Study in British Journal of General Practice says smear test invititations should be gender neutral to encourage trans men to get tested.

FFS Just when there is some light at the end of the tunnel you realise it's an oncoming train.

Results In total there were 137 participants; 80% identified as transmasculine,18% as non-binary, and the remaining participants reported other noncisgender identities. Sixty-four participants (47%) were eligible for cervical screening and 37 (58%) of those had been screened. Only 34 (53%) of those eligible felt they had sufficient information about cervical screening. Just over half (n = 71/134, 53%) stated they would like the option to self-swab for high-risk human papillomavirus. Only half (n = 68/134, 51%) of participants were in favour of an automatic invitation for cervical screening. Thematic analysis identified a number of additional barriers to and facilitators of screening.

So only half of those surveyed were in favour of an automatic invitation for cervical screening?

Plus the modal group (53% of participants) were aged 18-24, so hadn’t yet been reached the age threshold to be called for a cervical smear?

Just over half (n = 71/134, 53%) stated they would like the option to self-swab for high-risk human papillomavirus.

Okay, is that a sensible option? Doesn't immediately sound like it.

But I assume someone with a medical clue thinks it is, or they wouldn't be being asked the question? Can anyone fill me in?

I'm just having flashbacks to some of the things that Action for Trans Health were in favour of. It's made me a bit sceptical about asking certain groups for their ideas about healthcare.

FFS Just when there is some light at the end of the tunnel you realise it's an oncoming train.

Yep, this.

They are being prioritised over immigrant women with English as a second language, women who are functionally illiterate, women with additional needs that make understanding English more difficult, Deaf women who's first language is British Sign Language and who often have poor literacy due to educational barriers. Not to mention the older generation of women like my grandmother who left school at 14 and wouldn't have a clue what or where her cervix was or if she even had one!

The consultation on women's health services is still open if anyone wants to take it and address the above! I highlighted this issue specifically in my response as I am greatly concerned at vulnerable groups of women finding it even more difficult to access vital health info and services due to this erasure of female pronouns.

A whole 137 people - only 64 of whom were eligible for cervical screening.

In answer to Necessary's question about self-swabs, there is a trial to look at just that possibility: www.england.nhs.uk/2021/02/nhs-gives-women-hpv-home-testing-kits-to-cut-cancer-deaths/

The left hand doesnt know what the right is doing.

''Doctors have been told to stop mixing up sex and gender because it can end up with people getting the wrong treatment.''
www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2021/04/02/doctors-must-stop-mixing-sex-gender-patients-undergoing-wrong/

Apparently a trans man was without his knowledge reclassified as a man on his medical records so didn't get an invitation for a smear test.

Thats not an issue that would be affected by this though.

Thats a totally seperate, but also important issue. That transpeople should NOT under any circumstace, be put down as the opposite sex on medical records. Sure add in a 'this patient is trans and would prefer he/him' or similar i their notes, but changing females to male., and vice versa, is insanity! As I understand it though, its TRAs pushing for trans people to have lies in their medical records though, because 'feelings'?

If you have not attended cervical screening because of your gender identity, what are the reasons? (n= 52)

Don’t associate with/like thinking about that part of the body: 41 (79%)

Disclosure of gender identity: 28 (54%)

Where would you prefer to attend cervical screening? (n= 134)

Trans-specific health clinic (any): 86 (64%)

So if the reason that most of the participants that were eligible but hadn’t been screened was that they didn’t associate with that part of their body and/or didn’t want to disclose their status, and a majority of all respondents would prefer to deal with a trans-specific health clinic ...

... isn’t the answer obvious?

Having a male gender marker was identified in the thematic analysis as a barrier to screening for TMNB.

No shit Sherlock.

This is the paragraph that NICE seem to be inserting in their pregnancy and women's health guidelines which seems a good compromise to me ( tfrom the Postnatal care guideline)

"The guideline uses the terms 'woman' or 'mother' throughout. These should be taken to include people who do not identify as women but are pregnant or have given birth. Similarly, where the term 'parents' is used, this should be taken to include anyone who has main responsibility for caring for a baby."

If there needs to be specific material aimed at transmen then that should be produced and promoted to that group, not exclude other vulnerable groups by only considering one.

But I assume someone with a medical clue thinks it is, or they wouldn't be being asked the question? Can anyone fill me in?

This is a sensible option that is being piloted in a trial because so many women find the screening inconvenient or have difficulty being confident that a smear will be carried out in a trauma informed way.

www.england.nhs.uk/2021/02/nhs-gives-women-hpv-home-testing-kits-to-cut-cancer-deaths/

Run as a collaboration between Cancer Research UK (CRUK) and Kings:

www.kcl.ac.uk/research/cptu

@sleepyhead

This is the paragraph that NICE seem to be inserting in their pregnancy and women's health guidelines which seems a good compromise to me ( tfrom the Postnatal care guideline)

"The guideline uses the terms 'woman' or 'mother' throughout. These should be taken to include people who do not identify as women but are pregnant or have given birth. Similarly, where the term 'parents' is used, this should be taken to include anyone who has main responsibility for caring for a baby."

If there needs to be specific material aimed at transmen then that should be produced and promoted to that group, not exclude other vulnerable groups by only considering one.

This looks sensible to me and also correct, unlike 'women and' which I am totally against - there is no 'and' and it's asking for trouble to pretend there is.

Why does nobody ask women their opinion before they erase our words? What is wrong with women and people who have a cervix?

What is wrong with women and people who have a cervix?
It's inaccurate. No other people have a cervix and I think it's asking for big trouble further down the to pretend that there are - this is how we got into this mess.
I think the NICE paragraph is much better.

Soz further down the line

I'm going to re-post that as I'm feeling paranoid today but I'll leave the original post up too:

It's inaccurate. No other sex has a cervix or gets cervical cancer and I think it's asking for big trouble further down the to conflate sex and gender identity in this particular context.
I think the NICE paragraph is much better.

I am so tired of this
People with learning disabilities have poorer health outcomes and higher possibility of avoidable death than people without. In a recent (massive) review into this it established that poor communication plays a large part in this.
....but this gets thrown into the verge when the juggernaut of hurt feelings hurtles through. When I have tried to politely point out the importance of clear concise information that names who the health message is targeted at, people tie themselve in knots to prioritise the feelings of one one group of individuals over the actual lives and health outcomes of people for whom so much of society is inaccessible. It is appalling.

On another note...I am an exhausted middle aged woman who, as a parent carer, spends most of her time prioritising her child's needs. My health has fallen off a cliff after a year of shielding and caring. It feels, as I enter into the invisibility of knackered middle aged womanhood, and try to access help for non stop heavy bleeding, worries over how to manage appointments and look after myself whilst tying to care for another, that in losing the ability to name women, females, girls in their health is just adding to that feeling of being the invisible bloody woman (quite literally in my case)
One last thing...we have centuries of shame and embarrassment over talking about women's health issues to try and climb over. I don't want the language around women's health to obfuscate and hide because it is triggering to a group of people. I hoped my girls would grow up in a more empowering time, when they didn't have to shie away from naming themselves and issues that concern their physical well-being.
Rant over

Applauds HazeyJaneII

The fact that the NHS is only listening to these lobby groups intent on erasing women's identity, language and health provision in favour of their toxic ideologies is so depressing.

This is all so exhausting, the endless peddling of such garbage - " people with a cervix -" when according to my biology lessons, only women have cervixes. I hope there will be some meaningful pushback soon by society at large on this nonsense.

@Outbutnotoutout

Women and trans men!

That's inclusive without excluding women.

exactly! Why does it have to be one or the other?

Because then you'd be excluding the non binary cervix havers

In total there were 137 participants; 80% identified as transmasculine,18% as non-binary, and the remaining participants reported other noncisgender identities

WTAF does this mean??

So many issues with this but my main one would be is the health of transmen actually impacted by using the word woman?

• Don't FTM tend to be younger, more middle class, more educated than the general population? Wouldn't they be the demographic that KNOWS they have a cervix. We are always being told transpeople know their bodies and identities better than CIS anyone else so why not this?

• Aren't the majority of FTM largely in the generation that has had the HPV vaccine so the risks of an issue much smaller than general population?

• Also don't transmen tend to be female attracted and less likely to have sex with penis-based men lowering their risk of cervical cancer even further?

Basically this has nothing to do with the risk of cancer going undetected and everything to do with the removal of the word woman.

I think this highlights additional problems with using 'kind yet inaccurate' language.

The words men and women are useful terms in medicine. They tell us whose suspected appendicitis could be an ectopic pregnancy and whose couldn't. They tell us who will be rendered infertile by a silent std and who will be largely unaffected, but their partners not. They tell us whose iron levels are dangerously low or who is just on their period.

Add in language that distorts this or shields who is really what then the danger of mistakes is introduced. Not only on behalf of the medical professionals, but by an individual too. Who's to say ten year olds told they can really change sex truly understand they'll still need to have smears because they have a cervix. As Jade Goody's case shows, smears are absolutely vital and it should not just be assumed that the public understand why and who should get them.

We need more direct, transparent discourse on the subject, not less and if one girl in this new cohort of transmen dies because gender ideology led to a misunderstanding it is one too many.
The same as if one speaker of English as an additional language dies. It's unacceptable. Clear language saves lives.

What is wrong with women and people who have a cervix?

It's inaccurate. No other people have a cervix and I think it's asking for big trouble further down the to pretend that there are - this is how we got into this mess
I think the NICE paragraph is much better

Agreed. You cant change sex and no one should be being lead to believe they can and no one should be being advised on a treatment plan that is reliant on anyone but the person involved. I think.this is where some personal responsibility shoukd he taken. You cant control what others do so you have to work.on yourself to accept that so that you can access medical care without every one involved forced to comply with unreasonable demands.
Disease and Medicine deals with facts it doesn't care that you hate being old or disabled or female etc

I'm half inclined to just go along with this crap at this point on the sole condition that ALL references to men's health are aggressively treated in the same way. My uni had a 'men's mental health week'. Nope. No more. It's 'penis havers mental health week' from now on. I want to see the terminology unrelentingly call men 'prostate havers', 'ejaculators', the works. Why is it only ever women who seem to be negatively impacted by the gender stuff?