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How does testing HPV positive make women feel about sex and relationships?

By rmjlkfb, on 21 August 2019

A previous blog described how a new way of looking at cervical screening samples called primary HPV testing is being introduced into the NHS Cervical Screening Programme. In this post, we will describe the results from our recently published review which looked at whether testing HPV positive has an impact on how women feel about sex and relationships.

Why might testing HPV positive have an impact on sex and relationships?

Human papillomavirus (HPV) is a very common sexually transmitted infection (STI). It’s so common that most men and women will be infected with HPV at some point in their life, often without them knowing. Because of the sexually transmitted nature of HPV and with the introduction of HPV primary testing in England, we wanted to find out whether testing HPV positive could have an impact on sex and relationships. We reviewed all previous research that has explored the impact of an HPV positive result on sex and relationships among women.

What did we find?

There were 12 quantitative studies, which used surveys to collect data on a range of different outcomes such as sexual satisfaction, frequency of sex, interest in sex and feelings about partners and relationships. The results from these studies were very mixed with some studies suggesting that testing HPV positive did have an impact on sex and relationships and others suggesting that it didn’t.

Three main themes emerged from the 13 qualitative studies, which mainly used interviews to collect data:

  1. Source of HPV infection – women were concerned about where the infection came from and whether it came from a current or previous partner. Some expressed concerns that their partner had been unfaithful and wondered whether that was how they had acquired HPV.
  2. Transmission of HPV – concerns about passing on HPV to a partner were common. Some women were also worried about infecting their partner and their partner re-infecting them, not allowing the virus to be cleared and increasing the risk of cervical cancer.
  3. Impact of HPV on sex and relationships – Some women reported a reduced interest in and frequency of sex following HPV. HPV had a negative impact on some women’s sexual self-image. The risks associated with oral sex were mentioned by a few women who were concerned about passing HPV on to their partners in this way.

What do our findings mean?

It is possible that testing HPV positive may have an impact on sex and relationships for some women, however the extent of this is unclear. As none of the studies included in the review were in the context of primary HPV testing, this work highlights the need for further research in this context. As primary HPV testing is introduced more widely, it is important to understand the impact of an HPV positive result on sex and relationships to ensure that this does not cause unnecessary concern for women.

A new test for cervical screening is being rolled out, but how do the screening test results make women feel?

By Jo Waller, on 3 July 2019

By Emily McBride and Jo Waller

You might have heard that cervical screening is changing in England. If not, we’ve got you covered. In this post, we’re going to talk about the new cervical screening approach (called HPV primary screening), as well as our recently published research examining the way the test results make women feel.

What will happen under the new approach to cervical screening?

Soon all women who get screened in England will be tested for human papillomavirus (HPV), using an approach called HPV primary screening. HPV is a really common sexually transmitted infection which the body usually clears it on its own without it causing any problems. In fact, 4 out of 5 women have HPV at some point in their life. Sometimes, however, when the body can’t clear HPV, the virus can cause abnormal cells in the cervix to develop. With HPV primary screening, women who test positive for HPV will also have the cells in their cervix checked for any abnormal changes. However, women who test negative for HPV don’t get checked for abnormal cells because their risk of cervical cancer is really low – they don’t need to come back to screening again for another 3-5 years. Researchers have estimated that this new and improved screening approach will prevent an extra 500 cervical cancers a year in England. Screening can prevent cancer by picking up and treating cell changes before they develop into cancer.

How did women in our study feel after receiving their cervical screening test results?

Over the last few years, we’ve been doing a survey with women in areas where HPV primary screening has been tried out. We wanted to know how women felt about receiving the different test results at HPV primary screening compared with standard screening results. One test result was of particular interest to us because it’s new using this approach – HPV positive with normal cells (no abnormal changes). Women getting this result were asked to come back to screening 12 months later to see whether their body had cleared the HPV and to check no abnormal cells had developed. We thought it was possible that these women might feel anxious about being told they had HPV but having to wait 12 months to be screened again.

So what did we find? Well, women in the new group (HPV positive with normal cells) tended to be more anxious than those with normal results, and to be more worried about the result and about cervical cancer.  But reassuringly, those who had come back for a second HPV test 12 months after their first positive result had similar anxiety levels to those getting a normal result.  This suggests that being told you have HPV for the first time leads to feelings of anxiety and worry, but these are probably temporary for most women.

What do our research findings mean for cervical screening?

As the switch to HPV testing is introduced across the country, it’s really important for women taking part in screening to understand what the test is for and what the results will mean. Many women who go for screening don’t always read the information that’s sent with their invitation. This means practice nurses and other health professionals delivering screening have a key role to play in talking to women, making sure they understand what the change to the programme means, and encouraging them to read the new cervical screening leaflet. It’s also really important that health professionals and the cervical screening programme help support women who are anxious and are able to address the common concerns. We’re continuing to work closely with the NHS and Public Health England to help word HPV primary screening result letters. We also recently co-created a ‘Frequently Asked Questions’ information section to go alongside the HPV positive result letters, which we hope will help to mitigate unnecessary anxiety.

Unpicking the differences between types of cervical screening non-attenders

By Laura Marlow, on 21 March 2018

Every year around 28% of women who are eligible for cervical screening do not attend as recommended. Last year we blogged about a paper we had published exploring how these women can be divided into five broad sub-types; 1) unaware of screening, 2) unengaged with screening, 3) undecided about whether to go for screening, 4) decided not to go for screening and 5) decided to go but not yet gone. We also found some patterns in the way these different non-attender types are distributed across different groups of the population. For example, we found that women from ethnic minority groups were more likely to be unaware of screening and older women were more likely to have decided not to go. Understanding these patterns will help us to decide how interventions might be shaped differently for different types of non-attenders. For example, since women from ethnic minority groups are more likely to be unaware of cancer screening, targeted public health campaigns aimed at raising awareness within ethnic minority communities could be beneficial.

More recently, we have been delving a bit deeper and have tried to unpick some of the psychological and behavioural differences between the most common non-attender groups. Published in the journal Preventive Medicine this week, our new work shows some interesting findings. Most notably we showed that women who are unaware of screening tend to be more fatalistic, both about life in general and about cancer. They also have more negative beliefs about cancer outcomes. Women who had decided not to be screened frequently perceived themselves to be at lower risk of cervical cancer. And for women who were unengaged with screening, both more fatalistic beliefs and lower perceived risk were relevant. Health behaviours also varied between the different groups, with unaware women less likely to have seen a GP recently, and unengaged women less likely to seek out health information and more likely to actively avoid cancer information in the media.

This work will help us to identify the content of the messages that we might use for specific types of non-attenders. Interventions to raise awareness of screening should include messages that address fatalistic and negative beliefs about cancer. By contrast, information for women who have decided not to be screened may need to ensure they have an accurate knowledge of their risk of cervical cancer and that they understand the benefits of screening. This will help make sure women who decide not to take part are making an informed choice. Our next step it to outline what these interventions might look like – watch this space!

“I’ve never heard of it”; “It doesn’t apply to me”- Two very different reasons why ethnic minority women are not getting screened for cervical cancer

By Laura Marlow, on 22 July 2015

Over the last 10 years several studies in the UK have suggested that women from ethnic minority backgrounds are less likely to attend for cervical screening, the question of why this might be remains. Our recent work published last week in the British Journal of Cancer attempts to shed some light on this.  We surveyed 720 women aged 30-60 years old from Indian, Pakistani, Bangladeshi, African, Caribbean and white British backgrounds, using quota sampling to ensure a large enough sample of women from each ethnic group were included. Compared to the white British women, women in each of the ethnic minority groups were between 5 and 13 times more likely to be a non-attender at screening, i.e. they had not been screened in the last 5 years. This is after adjusting for age, marital status and education level.

Never heard of screening:
Among the ethnic minority women 24% said they had never heard of cervical screening or they had never received an invitation. These women were more likely to have migrated to the UK as adults, not speak English well and have no formal qualifications. This finding is in line with our previous qualitative work which suggests a general lack of awareness about the cervical screening programme. It therefore seems important that we find ways to engage these women with the issue of cancer screening, and raise their awareness of the programme and their eligibility to take part. In England, all women aged 25-64 who are registered with a GP receive regular screening invitations, but our findings suggest that this information isn’t getting through to some groups.

Been screened before, but not recently:
We also identified a different group of non-attenders who had been screened in the past (more than 5 years ago), but had not been screened as recommended, despite receiving a letter reminding them to go. Overall 37% of ethnic minority women fell into this group. These women were more likely to be in the older age group (50-60 years) but other socio-economic factors (such as education level, migration status and language) didn’t predict who fell into this group. Exploring the reasons for being overdue cervical screening in older women is important as recent work suggests that not being screened between the ages of 50 and 64 years is associated with a greater risk of cervical cancer when women are over 65 years. There is also evidence that women over 65 years from both Asian and Black backgrounds have higher rates of cervical cancer. We looked at a range of attitudes to screening and found that women who had not attended as recommended were more likely to think that screening didn’t apply to them, either because they did not have any symptoms or because they were not sexually active. Some considered screening to be important, but had difficulty fitting it in around other commitments. This finding is consistent with our qualitative work where one Bangladeshi woman said; “It wasn’t that I didn’t want to do it, I felt that it wasn’t a great priority for me at that time, everything else was more important”. For these women interventions should be designed to ensure an understanding of the purpose of screening and the potential benefits for asymptomatic women and those who are not currently sexual activity.

In this study and others, we are trying to gain a better understanding of why some people don’t take part in cancer screening. As this paper shows, people’s reasons can be very different, from not knowing anything about screening, to thinking it’s important but being too busy to go. By understanding more about these different reasons, we can help to ensure that everyone makes an informed choice about screening, and is able to take part if they want to. We hope this work will help to reduce inequalities in screening participation and make sure that everyone is properly informed about the purpose of screening.