Publication:

The correlation between colposcopy, cervical cytology and histopathology in the diagnosis and management of cervical lesions: a cross sectional study

Background The study was undertaken to see the correlation between cervical cytology, histopathology and colposcopy in the diagnosis and management of various cervical lesions.

Methods It is a cross sectional study conducted at a tertiary care hospital in Mumbai, in the department of obstetrics and gynecology from February 2007 to March 2008. A total 55 sexually active women were enrolled for the study who belonged to age group greater than 20 years with history of chronic leucorrhoea or post-coital bleeding/spotting, intermenstrual bleeding/spotting or examination findings of erosion, an unhealthy cervix, a lesion bleeding on touch or an abnormal or suspicious Papanicolaou smear. These women then underwent cytology, colposcopy and cervical biopsy.

Results The accuracy of cytology when compared to colposcopy was 81.82%. The accuracy of colpo-histopathology was 83.6%. The combined accuracy was 76.36%.

Conclusions The simultaneous use of cytological studies and screening colposcopy has been shown to increase the cervical cancer detection. Colposcopy offers an excellent tool in the hands of a gynaecologist to evaluate the uterine cervix and it is not possible to develop this kind of perspective by any other method.