Ethnic patterns of cytologic abnormalities in cervical smears in suriname, a high-risk area for cervical cancer.
OBJECTIVE
To determine the prevalence of cytologic abnormalities in cervical smears from women attending the first organized screening program in Suriname and to compare the prevalences in 4 Surinamese ethnicities with different cervical carcinoma incidences.


METHODS
Cervical scrapes were taken from women with 4 different ethnicities: Maroons, Amerindians, Javanese and Hindustani. Papanicolaou staining and cytologic screening were performed on 807 cervical smears. RESULTS Cervical cytologic abnormalities were seen in 13.4%, of which 8.1% (62 of 764) had atypical changes, 2.6% (20 of 764) had mild and 2.6% (20 of 764) had moderate and severe dysplasia/carcinoma in situ (CIS). The cytologic abnormalities varied between the ethnicities: 42.1% (83 of 197) in the Maroons and 2.3% (4 of 176), 5.0% (9 of 183) and 3.0% (6 of 208) in the Javanese, Amerindians, and Hindustani, respectively.


CONCLUSIONS
The high prevalence of moderate and severe dysplasia/CIS in all ethnicities correlates with the high cervical carcinoma incidence in Suriname. A significantly higher prevalence of mild abnormalities in the Maroons was observed; it did not reflect the relatively low cervical cancer incidence in this ethnicity. However, this can be explained by the possibility that these women have a different sexual lifestyle, leading to a higher prevalence of
Vermeulen
Christine F W
CF
Department of Pathology, Leiden University Medical Center, Leiden, The Netherlands. c.f.w.vermeulen@lumc.nl
Grünberg
Antoon
A
Peters
Lex A W
LA
van der Linden-Narain
Ingrid B S
IB
Vrede
M Albert
MA
Krul
Eveline J T
EJ
Dekker
Friedo W
FW
Fleuren
Gert Jan
GJ
D005006:Ethnicity; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008403:Mass Screening; D016017:Odds Ratio; D065006:Papanicolaou Test; D015995:Prevalence; D013532:Suriname / Q000453:epidemiology; D014245:Trichomonas Infections / Q000208:ethnology / Q000473:pathology; D002583:Uterine Cervical Neoplasms / Q000208:ethnology* / Q000473:pathology; D014626:Vaginal Smears; D002578:Uterine Cervical Dysplasia / Q000208:ethnology* / Q000473:pathology