[Cervix cytology: Cervex Brush versus conventional cotton swab]

Cervical smears should contain endocervical cells to be accepted as representative for a cytologic diagnosis. In this prospective study with 200 women we compared cytologic specimens obtained by Cervex-Brush (100 women) or by conventional cotton-swab (100 women) technique. The incidence of smears containing cylindrical and metaplastic cells was 85% in the Cervex-Brush group and only 58% in the cotton-swab group. We believe that the application of the Cervex-Brush or a similar instrument should result in fewer repeat smears and fewer false-negative smears and thus in an improvement of the cervical cytology.