Risk factors and relationship between screening periodicity and risk of cervical cancer among nurses and midwives. A cross-sectional study

Abstract

BACKGROUND: If nurses and midwives undergo cervical cancer screening regularly, they can become role models for other women regarding this screening. OBJECTIVES: The aims here were (i) to determine factors associated with undergoing cervical cancer screening; and (ii) to examine the association of cervical cancer screening periodicity with cervical cancer risk levels among nurses and midwives. DESIGN AND SETTING: Cross-sectional study in a public hospital. METHODS: 466 nurses and midwives participated in this study. The relationships between undergoing Pap smear screening and sociodemographic characteristics, cervical cancer risk factors, perception of cervical cancer risk and calculated cervical cancer risk levels were examined. Cervical cancer risk levels were determined using the "Your Disease Risk" assessment tool (Washington University). RESULTS: 35% of the nurses and midwives had undergone Pap smear testing at least once in their lifetimes. The odds of having undergone Pap smear testing were higher among smokers (odds ratio, OR: 2.08; 95% confidence interval, CI: 1.24-3.48) and among those who perceived their risk of cervical cancer to be high (OR: 3.60; 95% CI: 1.36-9.51). The frequency of undergoing Pap smear testing at least once in a lifetime was higher among primiparae (OR: 17.99; 95% CI: 6.36-50.84) and secundiparae (OR: 41.53; 95% CI: 15.01-114.91) than among nulliparae. No relationship was found between Pap smear test periodicity and calculated risk level. CONCLUSION: There is a need to assess motivational barriers that might lead to low levels of Pap smear screening among nurses and midwives who are role models for women regarding cervical cancer prevention.

Cervical Cancer Screening Practice Among Women: A Community Based Cross-Sectional Study Design

“…This finding is in line with a study from Turkey and Peru in 2018 where the frequency of undergoing Pap smear testing at least once in a lifetime was 1 times higher among multiparous women than nulliparous women. 28,37 Likewise, the current finding is comparable with the study finding from Dares Salaam, Tanzania, 12 and Tigray region 2019 and Dabat District 2020 38 where multiparous women were 3 times more likely to utilize the service than the nulliparous women. 39 The probable explanation for the similarity might be since previous pregnancies of a woman may expose her to receive health education many times compared to those with no previous pregnancies.…”

Knowledge, attitudes, and practice of cervical cancer prevention among health workers in rural health centres of Northern Uganda

“…Most of the female health workers in our study had been previously screened for cervical cancer. Other studies have documented a much lower uptake of cervical cancer screening by female health workers than in our study and those ranged from 6 to 41% [8,13,53,54,56,57,[61][62][63][66][67][68][69][70][71][72][73]. Female health workers who were not screened for cervical cancer cited various reasons for not attending screening including lack of access to screening services, misbeliefs about cervical cancer and screening, fear of the results and nonchalant attitude towards screening for cervical cancer.…”

“…Female health workers who were not screened for cervical cancer cited various reasons for not attending screening including lack of access to screening services, misbeliefs about cervical cancer and screening, fear of the results and nonchalant attitude towards screening for cervical cancer. Previous studies have reported similar observations about female health workers' lack of undertaking cervical cancer screening [8,57,58,62,63,68,69,[71][72][73][74].…”