Setting up cervical cancer screening programmes in the developing world

In this week's PLoS Medicine, Groesbeck Parham from the Centre for Infectious Disease Research in Zambia, and colleagues describe their Cervical Cancer Prevention Program, which has provided services to over 58,000 women over the past five years.

The authors share lessons learned from the program's implementation and its integration with existing HIV/AIDS programs, aiming to help other cervical cancer prevention initiatives succeed in the developing world and avoid placing additional burdens on health systems.

The authors say "By integrating a setting-appropriate protocol for cervical cancer prevention into public health infrastructures, and promoting shared leadership with government ownership, our program has not just saved lives, but has also established a new solution for routine prevention intervention in resource-constrained environments."