Can cervical screening prevent cancer?

The cervical screening programme isn’t 100% effective, but regular cervical screening every 3-5 years is the best way to detect changes to the cells of the cervix. Almost half of the women who develop cervical cancer| in the UK have never had a cervical screening test.

Benefits and difficulties of cervical screening Back to top

Benefits

• Cervical screening reduces the risk of developing cervical cancer.
• The number of women who develop cervical cancer has halved since the 1980s due to most women regularly having cervical screening.
• Cervical cancer is now an uncommon illness in the UK due to regular screening.
• NHS cervical screening saves around 5,000 lives a year in England.

Difficulties

• Cervical screening can show minor changes that may go back to normal on their own, but knowing they are there can be worrying.
• Sometimes, too few cells are taken or the cells can’t be seen properly and the test will need to be done again.
• Regular cervical screening can prevent cancers from developing, but it doesn’t prevent every case.
• Cervical screening doesn’t pick up every abnormality of the cervix.
• Some women find the test an unpleasant experience.

Reliability of cervical screening Back to top

Cervical screening, like other screening tests, isn’t perfect. So it is not always possible to detect early cell changes that can lead to cancer.

Abnormal cervical cells in your sample may not be recognised because:

• sometimes they don’t look very different from normal cells
• there may be very few abnormal cells in the sample.

Occasionally, a test will have to be taken again because:

• there may not have been enough cervical cells in your sample to give an accurate assessment
• the sample may not have been properly prepared
• the container your sample was put in may have been broken.

Although every effort is made to ensure the screening programme works properly, very occasionally mistakes happen.

In recent years, the cervical screening programme has been improved so that mistakes are far less likely. All screening samples are now checked by two technicians so that the chance of missing an abnormality is greatly reduced.

Cervical screening is very effective at picking up early changes, but you should see your GP if you have any unusual symptoms|, such as bleeding after sex or between periods. If you have symptoms, you may need to be referred for tests.