What is Screening?
Cancer takes time to develop – at early stages, we cannot see or feel the cancer, but at later stages, breast cancer can be felt as a lump or there can be changes in the nipple, and cervical cancer can cause bleeding through the vagina. Screening using ultrasound or mammogram for breast cancer, or a PAP smear or HPV DNA test for cervical cancer can help to detect cancer when we cannot see or feel the cancer with our own hands. Detecting cancers using these screening tests means that a doctor can treat cancers with higher chances of cure and with less side effects to the woman.
Which is why we say, early detection of breast and cervical cancer saves lives.
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The most lives are saved by 2 yearly mammography starting at the age of 50.
Did You Know?
Who needs screening?
Every woman is different and every woman’s chance of develop breast or cervical cancer changes over time.
For breast cancer, chances of developing breast cancer increase with age and chances are also higher for women who have close relatives who have breast cancer.
We now know that women who have more children and who have breastfed the children for a longer time have lower chances of developing breast cancer.
Taking all this together, doctors recommend women who do not have close relatives with breast or other cancers to have mammography screening every 1 – 2 years from the age of 50 to 74; and women who have close relatives with breast or other cancers may need to consider starting screening earlier (usually from the age of 40).
Doctors may also recommend an ultrasound for women who have dense breasts or women who are young but have many relatives with breast or other cancers.
For cervical cancer, chances of developing cervical cancer increases for women who have had sex before, especially if they have had sex with multiple people. Doctors recommend women who are sexually active to have a Pap smear every 3 years starting from when they first have sex, or to have a HPV DNA test every 5 years. A repeat test may be needed earlier if either of these tests are positive.
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