Higher Risk Of Cervical Cancer Symptoms For US Women Above 60, Study Shows

High risk cervical cancer symptoms in United States are more common among older women, with the rates up by 55% in cases per 100,000 women. Women of ages 65-69 have increased chances of cervical cancer, with the rates being up as 85%. In African-American women, the rates are further higher to 126%. The researchers from the University Of Maryland School Of Medicine published recalculated cervical cancer rates in the journal Cancer. The study was led by Dr. Anne Rositch, who is the lead researcher and an assistant professor of epidemiology and public health, YottaFire reports.

With exceptions of women who had hysterectomies in the United States and their cervix being removed during surgery, the high risk cervical cancer symptoms are not generally found among these women. Especially older women who feel that their gynaecological examinations have not been done regularly stand a much greater chance of high risk cervical cancer symptom development at its nascent stages.

Dr. Tara Shirazian, a gynaecologist at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York told CBSNews.com, "The study actually looked at age as one specific risk factor for development of cervical cancer and for having hysterectomies, and both those two things increases as women age. Over the age of 50 to 65 was really the group and then they even noticed a second peak in women over the age of 70."

The higher rates of hysterectomy related to fibroid surgery are more commonly observed among African-American women. The cervical cancer is caused by a sexually transmitted disease commonly known as HPV (Human Papilloma Virus). The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists now recommend women between the ages of 21-29 to have a PAP test every three years and those older women in the age group of 30-65 to undergo HPV screening plus a PAP test every five years and those over 65, need not be tested if their previous screenings have been negative.

"Current guidelines recommend exiting women with recent negative screening from routine screening at age 65 years, and yet our corrected calculations show that women just past this age have the highest rate of cervical cancer," said senior author Patti Gravitt, PhD, of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in a press release.

However, more research is required to determine if the high risk cervical cancer symptoms increasing with age as well as risk disparity with black women - is owing to problems with the current screening guidelines of if required necessary precautions are not being taken to prevent cervical cancer incidence rate in the country, especially during women's menopausal age. As HPV is the most common cause of cervical cancer, a HPV vaccine is also recommended.

"In order to make accurate estimates of the true rates of cervical cancer by age in the U.S. and monitor trends in the occurrence of disease, it is important to calculate the occurrence of cervical cancer only among women who are at risk," Rositch was quoted by Fox News.