Evaluation of 37,438 consecutive cervical smear results in the Turkish population

INTRODUCTION: Retrospective evaluation of cervical smear results of women who attended our gynecology policlinics with various symptoms and discussion of the results in the light of the literature. MATERIAL AND METHODS: We performed a retrospective investigation on 37,438 Pap smear results of women who attended our hospital between January 2011 and December 2012 with a variety of symptoms. RESULTS: Average patient age was 43 (18–83) years. Of the Pap smear results analyzed, in 21,503 (57.4%) findings were within normal limits, while 153 (0.41%) showed epithelial cell abnormalities and 15,358 (41%) showed inflammation. Four hundred and twenty-four (1.1%) cases were reported to have inadequate Pap smear samples for evaluation. Of the epithelial cell abnormalities, 136 (88.8%) were squamous cell abnormalities and 17 (11.1%) were glandular cell abnormalities. Atypical squamous cells of unknown significance (ASCUS) were reported for 117 (0.3%) Pap smears, while other epithelial abnormalities included atypical glandular cells of unknown significance (AGUS) in 17 (0.05%) cases, low-grade squamous intraepithelial lesion (LSIL) in 8 (0.02%) cases, atypical squamous cells with possible high grade lesion (ASC-H) in 8 (0.02%) cases and high-grade squamous intraepithelial lesion (HSIL) in 3 (0.008%) cases. CONCLUSIONS: Public awareness should be raised on the importance of Pap smear testing repeated at appropriate intervals in the prevention and early diagnosis of cervical cancer. Health education should become more widespread, and the importance of screening programs and regular check-ups should be emphasized more often on this issue in the media.