Importance of prevention and screening of cervical cancer in Nigeria (Bayelsa State)

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Cervical cancer is the most common genital cancer and one of the leading causes of death among female population. Fortunately, this cancer is preventable by screening for premalignant lesions but this is rarely provided and hardly utilised. The aims and objectives are to describe the knowledge and attitude of Bayelsa State women concerning prevention and screening of cervical cancer and to know about the reason why it's necessary for them to be screened for cervical cancer. Data were obtained through survey forms and by interviews conducted by researchers. 404 questionnaires was administered to women from age 25- 45< that comes to the hospital for gynaecology problems and antenatal clinics in the gynaecology department. (62.1%) of these women are married, and (36.6%) are single. In this study the awareness of Pap smear screening test is 41.3% which is a bit high. It shows that the awareness of Pap smear test is higher among students. That is to show that, the level of understanding about Pap smear test is high among the educated women. These are the major findings of this research. The knowledge regarding risk factor for cervical cancer among the women is very low, 31.1% knows that having more than one sexual partner is a risk factor, while 15.8% only are aware that smoking is a risk factor. When we compare this to those that don't have any awareness, it's very clear that there is lack of awareness concerning cervical cancer. Knowledge regarding symptoms, 49.7% of the respondents are knowledgeable that cervical cancer can be prevented and 20.7% also know about menorrhagia as symptom for cervical cancer which is not too good because 66.8% of the respondents have heard about cervical cancer and 49.7% heard through health workers so there should be some understanding concerning the risk factors and symptoms but is not as expected. Based on this urgent attention is needed in the State to create awareness concerning cervical cancer and make available more screening centers in the state.

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prevention, screening, cervical cancer
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