What is a smear test?

Cervical screening (a smear test) checks the health of your cervix. The cervix is the opening to your womb from your vagina. It's not a test for cancer, it's a test to help prevent cancer. 

Why is it important?

Cervical screening checks a sample of cells from your cervix for certain types of human papillomavirus (HPV). These types of HPV can cause abnormal changes to the cells in your cervix and are called "high risk" types of HPV.

If these types of HPV are found during screening (an HPV positive result), the sample of cells is then checked for abnormal changes. If abnormal cells are not treated, they may turn into cervical cancer.

Who is eligible?

Everyone with a cervix between the ages of 25 and 64 should go for regular cervical screening. You'll get a letter in the post inviting you to make an appointment. If you missed your last cervical screening, you do not need to wait for a letter to book an appointment.

For more information please visit the NHS website.

Once the sample has been sent off and tested, the hospital should contact you directly with the results. Results can take up to 3 months to come back, although usually they come a bit sooner than that. We do have access to your results but you should have been contacted by the hospital by the time we have access to them.

However, if you have any queries, please feel free to contact us. Please note we have no control over the speed of testing and are unable to expedite this process.