Attendance to cervical cancer screening in family practices in The Netherlands

The effectiveness of three different organizational approaches to cervical cancer screening (community based, family practice based, and a combination) was evaluated in nationally representative family practices.

We selected 122 family practices with a computerized sex-age register from a database of 1, 251 family practices, representative of all 4,758 family practices in The Netherlands. Approximately 40 practices were linked with each approach. We measured the attendance, the reasons for nonattendance, and the influence of a reminder on the attendance of women invited for cervical screening in September, October, and November 1996. The patients were grouped according to age. A cross-sectional design was used for the study.

For younger women, the total attendance rate, coverage (percentage of women "protected" against cervical cancer), and control rate (percentage of women with medical reasons for nonattendance or postponement of the smear) were highest in practices using the family practice-based approach (68, 77, and 90%, respectively) and lowest in practices with the community-based approach (53, 62, and 68%, respectively). For older women, the family practice-based approach and the combination approach were associated with attendance rates significantly higher than those for the community-based approach (approximately 60, 80, and 80% vs 47, 67, and 70%, respectively). A reminder sent by the family physician to women not responding to an initial invitation increased the attendance rate by 7 to 11% in both age categories, depending on who had sent the first invitation.

A family practice-based cervical screening approach appeared to be the most effective at a national level, achieving the highest attendance rate, coverage, and control rate.