January is National Cervical Cancer Awareness & Screening Month, a time of the year when any woman should think about when was the last time they saw a gynecologist.

 

Cervical cancer is the second most common form of cancer among women after breast cancer. Almost 250,000 people suffering from this disease die every year, according to the World Health Organization. In the United States, the disease claims the lives of approximately 3,870 women annually from over 11,000 cases diagnosed.

 

Cervical cancer is usually a slow-growing cancer that may not have symptoms but can be found with a regular Pap test (a procedure in which cells are scrapped from the cervix and looked at under a microscope). Cervical cancer might take years to form. A Pap test can detect pre-cancerous changes before they develop into cancer.

 

One of the factors that could lead to the development of cervical cancer is the human papilloma virus (HPV), especially the HPV 16 subtype. The HPV is spread during sexual intercourse, but in the case of healthy women, it disappears spontaneously over time.

 

It is important to detect cervical cancer in its early stages, doctors say. If detected early enough, the cure rate – or five-year-survival rate- is about 80 percent, Robert E. Bristow, director of the Kelly Gynecologic Oncology Service and the Ovarian Cancer Center of Excellence at Johns Hopkins Hospital, said.

 

Women with cervical cancer have two options, surgery, and radiation, depending on the gravity of their disease.

 

What can you do to avoid cervical cancer? Well, you can start by leading a healthy life based on regular exercise and a healthy diet, leave worries aside and protect yourself from sexual transmitted diseases, especially from HPV. Girls and women aged 9 to 26 can get vaccinated with Gardasil, Merck’s HPV vaccine, which prevents four types of the HPV virus known to be involved in 90 percent of genital warts and 70 percent of cervical cancer.