One in every 100 women in Europe will develop cervical cancer.

If diagnosed early, this can be treated. Undiagnosed, it spreads into other parts of the body - leading ultimately to death.

Yet life-saving cervical cancer screening is today at an all-time low, with many women skipping so-called ‘PAP smears’ to avoid potential discomfort at the doctors.

A proposal to simplify cervical cancer screening could end up missing some cancers, researchers and patient advocates say. And that could be especially true for minority women.

Scientists have found that some types of cancers have more of a sweet tooth than others.

Unlike many gynecologic cancers, there is a vaccination and screening test for cervical cancer, an important distinction in preventing and identifying the disease, according to Ursula Matulonis, MD, medical director of Gynecologic Oncology in Dana-Farber’s Susan F. Smith Center for Women’s Cancers, and Colleen Feltmate, MD, director of minimally invasive surgery in Gynecologic Oncology at Brigham and Women’s Hospital.

The death rate from cervical cancer in the United States is considerably higher than previously estimated and the disparity in death rates between black women and white women is significantly wider, according to a study published Monday in the journal Cancer.

Despite the declining incidence of cervical cancer as a result of the introduction of screening programs, globally it remains a leading cause of cancer-related death in women. Outcomes for patients who are diagnosed with anything but early-stage disease remain poor.

But just because this gynecologic cancer occurs less frequently doesn’t mean it’s less deadly.  In fact, cervical cancer was once the No. 1 leading cause of cancer death for women in the US. What’s worse? The disease is almost 100 percent preventable. This fact is especially chilling for Latinas, who have the highest incidence of cervical cancer and the second-highest death rate from the disease.

Half of young women are unable to properly label a vagina on a medical diagram, while 65 per cent have admitted they have a problem simply using the words vagina or vulva.

Avastin works by interfering with the blood vessels that fuel the development of cancerous cells. The new indication for cervical cancer is approved for use in combination with chemotherapy drugs paclitaxel and cisplatin or in combination with paclitaxel and topotecan.

A new study has revealed marked differences in the genomic terrain of the two most common types of cervical cancer, suggesting that patients might benefit from therapies geared to each type’s molecular idiosyncrasies.........
.....The research was supported by grants from the American Cancer Society, the Conquer Cancer Foundation of the American Society of Clinical Oncology, the Team Maureen Cervical Cancer Fund, and the Friends of Dana-Farber Cancer Institute.