Oyo steps up action to prevent cervical cancer cases, deaths

OYO State government, on Monday, said it is building the capacity of its doctors and nurses to stem cases and deaths from cervical cancer, the commonest cancer in the female reproductive organ.

Permanent Secretary, Oyo State Ministry of Health, Dr Soji Adeyanju, flagging off a five-day colposcopy training for doctors and nurses, in collaboration with the University of Maryland, Baltimore; University of New Mexico and the Centre for Bioethics and Research, in Ibadan, said the training is to stem cervical cancer cases and deaths through early detection and prompt treatment of cases.

Adeyanju, represented by Dr Wole Lawal, stated that women can now access free cervical cancer diagnostics services in four hospitals, which are Adeoyo Maternity Hospital, Moniya General Hospital, Ring Road State Hospital and Oyo State Secretariat Staff Clinic, all in Ibadan.

He declared that with colposcopy, it is easy to detect any abnormality in the cervix, the mouth of the womb, that could lead to cancer and to quickly institute treatment.

“This training and donated colposcope will be an adjuvant to visual inspection after application of vinegar and for those that have screened positive for human papillomavirus (HPV), an infection established to cause cervical cancer.

“So, we employ women to get screened, because early detection of cancer of the cervix is very important but its late detection can kill,” he said.

Leader trainer, Dr Oludare Morhason-Bello, said the doctors and nurses were carefully selected after a meeting of stakeholders because if cervical cancer is to be eliminated, there is the need for a robust strategy in the state.

He said although cervical cancer is preventable, a disconnect exists between its prevention and its detection in Nigeria, as a result of the approach mostly adopted for public screening of women.

“It is no longer news that cervical cancer is caused by HPV infection that is acquired sexually. Now, a woman does not need to have multiple sexual partners for her to acquire HPV, but any woman that has had sexual experience is at risk of the infection.

“Eight to nine out of 10 females will clear the infection; it is only in 10 to 15 percent of these women that the infection persists. With HIV, the proportion of women with a persistent HPV infection further increases.

“But the procedure now is to detect those with persistent HPV infection because it can lead a woman to develop cervical cancer if she has not been screened for 10 years,” Dr Morhason-Bello said.

The trainer, therefore, urged for increasing advocacy and mobilisation for the uptake of the vaccine against cervical cancer that is to be flagged off by the Federal Government in September, starting in 16 states of the federation.

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