A Papanicolaou test, smear test or as it is commonly known, a Pap smear is an uncomfortable experience for many women across the globe. It can not only be awkward but invasive and at times painful. Why do we do this to ourselves? It has been an annual health precaution and recommendation, until now.
It has recently come to the attention of the U.S. Preventative Services Task Force, an independent panel of national experts who make preventive health care recommendations based on evidence from available scientific studies, that in fact there is insufficient evidence to support the necessity of an annual pelvic exam in asymptomatic women. The federal agency goes on to say that diseases that the Pap smear can supposedly help detect, such as ovarian and cervical cancer, are unnoticeable during early stages or in asymptomatic patients.
To smear or not to smear?
The Task Force questions whether a healthy woman would even benefit from the annual pelvic exam since it may not yield much information if she has no physical indications of any illnesses. If this is the case, there may not be a need to have these tests unless one does show specific symptoms. This may come as good news to many women who are dreading their next vaginal check-up, however, does this mean science is telling us not to get smeared?
According to TODAY, the chair of the U. S. Preventative Services Task Force and a professor of medicine at the University of California, San Francisco, Dr. Kirsten Bibbins-Domingo, did not exactly clear the air on what women worldwide should and should not do regarding preventative procedures. She did make a call to scientists to conduct more research and gather more information on such issues. She stated that the health-oriented agency does not exactly advise women to have a Pap smear nor does the group recommend against it.
“We think women should be aware of that and talk to their doctors about whether the annual exam is right for them”, she said.
The federal task force included the research of the risks and benefits associated with Pap smears in their call for more evidence. According to the studies conducted, whose findings may vary depending on the study, false-positive rates for ovarian cancer are located between 1.2% and 8.6% and false-negative rates range from 0% to 100%. Furthermore, between 5% and 36% of women who had abnormal findings later went into surgery.
At the same time, health practitioners do believe there are some benefits to the exam; one of which mainly concerns young women who tend not to know the processes happening within them and what symptoms are abnormal. The vagina, along with the uterus and all that resides there, is intriguingly complex organs that require a level of awareness to ensure that whatever is plotting down there is not a sign of failing health or risky behavior.
At this juncture in medical science where yet another health recommendation has evaporated into a yet-to-be-confirmed-truth, one suggestion is to be healthy and attentive to the body’s various needs and often misunderstood signals.