5th March 2024
5 March update
Last October we wrote to over 17,000 women to advise them that their previous smear result was being reviewed as a precautionary measure as part of the Southern Trust Cervical Screening Review.
We have sent a letter to these women to update them on the progress of the review.
There are two pathways in the Cervical Screening Review:
- Slide review
- Cervical screening review smear clinics
This Review is now complete for almost 6,500 of these women (37% of the total to be reviewed) as summarised below (figures as at 01.03.2024):
| Number of women review complete | |
| Slide Review | 2,680 |
| Cervical Review Smear Clinic | 1,249 |
| *Smear via NI Cervical Screening Programme | 2,271 |
| Patients who have opted out of the Cervical Screening Review | 210 |
*Note the NI Cervical Screening Programme which undertakes routine smear tests continues to run outside of the Southern Trust Cervical Screening Review. This programme is where you are invited to attend for a routine smear test by your GP every 3 or 5 years dependent upon your age. Therefore, should you receive an invite by your GP to attend for your routine smear test, we encourage all women to avail of this.
More recent smear as part of the NI Cervical Screening Programme
For women who are due a routine smear with their GP as part of the routine Northern Ireland Cervical Screening Programme, please attend your appointment as normal. This recent smear sample will be tested using the new Primary Human Papillomavirus (HPV) pathway. This most recent smear test, which will indicate current HPV status and risk of developing cervical cancer is the most important result, therefore, your previous smear slide will no longer need to be reviewed as part of the Cervical Screening Review Process. The Trust will be notified of this recent smear result.
Outcomes
At the start of the Cervical Screening Review, the Trust anticipated that for the majority of women their smear result would not change. Nevertheless, it was important to look again for abnormalities as a precautionary measure and to double check that the correct result was given.
Whilst it is still too early to provide definitive feedback on the overall outcome of the review, the Trust can advise that, to date, the vast majority of slide review results have been the same as the original one. In addition, currently no ‘high-grade’ abnormalities have been found (high-grade abnormalities are cell changes that could progress to cancer if left unchecked or untreated).
Timeline for Cervical Screening Review completion
To be open and transparent, it was agreed that the Southern Trust laboratory would not participate in the slide review aspect of the Cervical Screening Review. Therefore, the delivery of the slide review itself is reliant upon other HSC Trust laboratories in Northern Ireland. After a slow start, the Trust are pleased to confirm that we have been able to increase the number of slides being reviewed by other Trusts each week. The Southern Trust dedicated Cervical Screening Review smear clinics also continue to run weekly. The Trust is working towards completing the Cervical Screening Review for all women by the summer of this year. However, we can assure you that as soon as your slide review is complete, we will write to you directly with the outcome of our findings.
The backlog of smear results from NI Cervical Screening Programme
In December 2023, the Northern Ireland Cervical Screening programme fully introduced primary HPV testing into the routine cervical screening pathway. This is a more effective way of identifying those women who are at risk of developing cervical cancer and is enabling results to be delivered for most women much more quickly.
As you may be aware, there has been a backlog in reporting cervical smear tests across all laboratories in Northern Ireland prior to HPV testing being introduced, with some women having to wait a several months for their routine smear result. All laboratories are currently in the process of clearing their backlog of cervical screening samples using the new primary HPV testing. Southern Trust plan to have the backlog of test results cleared by the end of March.
More information is available at www.nidirect.gov.uk/articles/cervical-cancer.