WOMEN WHO HAVE TAKEN THE PAPANICOLAOU TEST: CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE ‘FAMILY HEALTH’ STRATEGY

Abstract

An epidemiological, transversal, quantitative and descriptive study, with the objective of uncovering the socio-demographic and clinical characteristics of women who had the Papanicolaou test applied by nurses of the Family Health Strategy in the town of Novo Cruzeiro in the Brazilian state of Minas Gerais. Secondary data was assembled from the Ministry of Health’s I.T. department’s ‘System for Information on Cervical Cancer’. The data was from the period 2006 to 2009 and totalled 8,281 exams, in the proportion of 0.38 of exams of women between 25 and 59 years of age. The majority were in the age band 25 to 34 years (50.54%) educated at least to primary school level (33.99%), had taken the pap test previously (73.92%), and had had the last test within one to three years (61.05%). The results point to the need to strengthen educational measures and to mobilize the community in order to increase adhesion to health care practices in the routine f working with family health.

Keywords

• Women’s health
• Cervix neoplasm prevention
• Epidemiology
• Nursing