An approach to the problem of false negatives in gynecologic cytologic screening

A system of quality control for gynecologic cytologic screening designed to minimize the problem of false-negative cytologic reports is proposed. The system involves the harvesting of "quality control" smears, at the time of colposcopic examination, from patients referred to colposcopy because of previous abnormal smears that had been interpreted as representing dysplasia or neoplasia. These quality control smears are then submitted to the cytology laboratory, indistinguishable from bona fide cases, among the routine smears. This appears to be a more effective means of quality control than the current standard system used in the United States, which involves cytology laboratories routinely rescreening 10% of the slides reported out as "negative".