Efficacy of a rapid cell spectrophotometer in screening for cervical cancer

Abstract

A carefully controlled double‐blind study of the usefulness of a new device as an aid in screening for cervical cancer was carried out. The device measures and displays multiple spectrophotometric properties of cells in liquid suspension at rapid rates. The results of a test involving cervical swab and vaginal wash specimens from 1155 patients are presented. Cytologic smears, obtained concurrently with samples for the device and processed by the Papanicolaou technique, were independently evaluated. Biopsy results on those patients considered by cytology to have cancer were used in evaluating the device. Forty‐five per cent of the swab samples were readable by the device; of these it selected 35%, which included 85% of the readable cases with cancer. With vaginal wash samples 50% of the known cancers were missed. These results reflect the efficiency of the cell, sampling procedure as well as the performance of the device itself; inefficient sampling procedures account for the low percentage of readable swab samples and for some of the cases that were missed with these samples, as well as the poor results obtained with the vaginal wash samples. Copyright © 1968 American Cancer Society