Meeting the challenges of cervical cancer screening and HPV vaccination in the UK
Intended for healthcare professionals
Evidence and practice    

Meeting the challenges of cervical cancer screening and HPV vaccination in the UK

Roxanne Westwood Staff nurse, Urology, Liverpool University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, Liverpool, England
Joanna Lavery Senior lecturer adult nursing, Nursing and Allied Health, City Campus, Liverpool John Moores University, Liverpool, England

Why you should read this article:
  • To learn about the causes, signs and symptoms of cervical cancer

  • To recognise the reasons that prevent some women from attending cervical screening or receiving vaccination for human papillomavirus (HPV)

  • To understand the preventive and educational strategies that can encourage women to access vaccination

Cervical cancer is one of the most common cancers affecting women worldwide, despite also being one of the most preventable and treatable. Most deaths from cervical cancer could be avoided if women underwent regular cervical screening and received the human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccination. Suboptimal education, fear and embarrassment, as well as cultural traditions, are some of the issues that can prevent women from accessing HPV vaccination and cervical screening. This article identifies the causes, signs and symptoms of cervical cancer and discusses preventive and educational strategies. The authors also explore some of the challenges that prevent women from attending cervical screening or receiving the HPV vaccine, as well as examining some of the innovations that aim to reduce these challenges.

Primary Health Care. doi: 10.7748/phc.2021.e1742

Peer review

This article has been subject to external double-blind peer review and checked for plagiarism using automated software

@LaveryJoanna

Correspondence

J.V.Lavery@ljmu.ac.uk

Conflict of interest

None declared

Westwood R, Lavery J (2021) Meeting the challenges of cervical cancer screening and HPV vaccination in the UK. Primary Health Care. doi: 10.7748/phc.2021.e1742

Published online: 27 October 2021

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