Simple vinegar test to prevent cervical cancer death
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Tata Memorial’s cheap vinegar test detects cervical cancer faster (Thinkstock photos/Getty Images)
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simple vinegar test could prevent 73,000 deaths from cervical cancer
worldwide each year, the authors of a large-scale study of women in India said on Sunday. The research effort was led by Dr. Surendra Shastri of Tata Memorial Hospital in Mumbai.
Wealthy countries have managed to reduce cervical cancer deaths by 80 per cent thanks to the widespread use of regular Pap smears. But cervical cancer remains the leading cause of cancer death among women in India and many other developing countries lacking the money, doctors, nurses or laboratories for widespread screening. The vinegar test, while not perfect, offers a solution to that problem.
A primary health care worker swabs the woman's cervix with vinegar, which causes pre-cancerous tumors to turn white.The results are known a minute later when a bright light is used to visually inspect the cervix. Aside from the cost savings,the instantaneous results are a major advantage for women in rural areas who might otherwise have to travel for hours to see a doctor. Usha Devi, one of the women who participated in the study, says it saved her life. "Many women refused to get screened.Some of them died of cancer later,"Devisaid."NowI feel everyone should get tested. "
This low-tech visual examination cut the cervical cancer death rate by 31 percent, the study found. It could prevent 22,000 deaths in India and 72,600 worldwide each year, researchers estimate. "That's amazing. That's remarkable. It's a very exciting result,"said Dr.Ted Trimble of the National Cancer Institute in the US, the main sponsor of the study.
India has nearly one-third of the world's cases of cervical cancer - more than 140,000 each year. "It's not possible to provide Pap smear screening in developing countries. We don't have that much money or staff or equipment, so a simpler method had to be found, Shastri said.
Starting in 1998, researchers enrolled 75,360 women to be screened every two years with the vinegar test. Another 76,178 women were chosen for a control, or comparison group that just got cancer education at the start of the study and vouchers for a free Pap test - if they could get to the hospital to have one. Women in either group found to have cancer were offered free treatment at the hospital. Still, this quick and free cancer screening was a hard sell in a deeply conservative country. Social workers were sent into the slums to win people over.
"We went to every single house in the neighborhood assigned to us introducing ourselves and asking them to come to our health talks. They used to come out of curiosity, listen to the talk but when we asked them to get screened they would totally refuse," said one social worker, Vaishnavi Bhagat. "The women were both scared and shy. There was a sense of shame about taking their clothes off. Sometimes just the idea of getting tested for cancer scared them," said Urmila Hadkar, another health worker.
The study was planned for 16 years, but results at 12 years showed lives were saved with the screening. Hence independent monitors advised offering it to the women in the comparison group.
Wealthy countries have managed to reduce cervical cancer deaths by 80 per cent thanks to the widespread use of regular Pap smears. But cervical cancer remains the leading cause of cancer death among women in India and many other developing countries lacking the money, doctors, nurses or laboratories for widespread screening. The vinegar test, while not perfect, offers a solution to that problem.
A primary health care worker swabs the woman's cervix with vinegar, which causes pre-cancerous tumors to turn white.The results are known a minute later when a bright light is used to visually inspect the cervix. Aside from the cost savings,the instantaneous results are a major advantage for women in rural areas who might otherwise have to travel for hours to see a doctor. Usha Devi, one of the women who participated in the study, says it saved her life. "Many women refused to get screened.Some of them died of cancer later,"Devisaid."NowI feel everyone should get tested. "
This low-tech visual examination cut the cervical cancer death rate by 31 percent, the study found. It could prevent 22,000 deaths in India and 72,600 worldwide each year, researchers estimate. "That's amazing. That's remarkable. It's a very exciting result,"said Dr.Ted Trimble of the National Cancer Institute in the US, the main sponsor of the study.
India has nearly one-third of the world's cases of cervical cancer - more than 140,000 each year. "It's not possible to provide Pap smear screening in developing countries. We don't have that much money or staff or equipment, so a simpler method had to be found, Shastri said.
Starting in 1998, researchers enrolled 75,360 women to be screened every two years with the vinegar test. Another 76,178 women were chosen for a control, or comparison group that just got cancer education at the start of the study and vouchers for a free Pap test - if they could get to the hospital to have one. Women in either group found to have cancer were offered free treatment at the hospital. Still, this quick and free cancer screening was a hard sell in a deeply conservative country. Social workers were sent into the slums to win people over.
"We went to every single house in the neighborhood assigned to us introducing ourselves and asking them to come to our health talks. They used to come out of curiosity, listen to the talk but when we asked them to get screened they would totally refuse," said one social worker, Vaishnavi Bhagat. "The women were both scared and shy. There was a sense of shame about taking their clothes off. Sometimes just the idea of getting tested for cancer scared them," said Urmila Hadkar, another health worker.
The study was planned for 16 years, but results at 12 years showed lives were saved with the screening. Hence independent monitors advised offering it to the women in the comparison group.
