THE UNMET NEEDS
Cervical cancer is still the leading cause of women's deaths from malignant diseases worldwide. Every year about 500,000 women get cervical cancer and 250,000 die. There are 1.7 billion women at risk in the world, but only 10%, at average, get cervical cancer screening protection.

In developed countries women are much better protected from cervical cancer with regular Pap test screening. For example, 50 million Pap tests are performed each year in the US, a cancer control measure that dramatically has reduced the mortality from this disease. However, there are still 20% women at risk in the US who do not participate. This Global Academy for Women's Health has conducted a survey to assess the reasons why these American women do not get cervical cancer protection although (according to the survey) more than 95% of them are aware of Pap test and have real opportunity to get screening. The most frequent reasons for avoiding the testing was being uncomfortable with the pelvic exam, the cost of the test, and having a stressful time while waiting for the results. However, 95% of women agreed that if some more acceptable variant of Pap test could be introduced, like self-sampling, they would gladly regularly have screening.

The situation is quite different in developing countries. There are still objective barriers for world-wide mass cervical cancer screening, e.g., cost of the test, lack of infrastructure to perform Pap test, no access for testing, fear of testing, lack of knowledge about cervical cancer and the possibility to prevent it (Pap test), uncomfortable pelvic exam and various cultural/religious restrains to visit gynecologist. As a result, in these areas only about 5% women at risk are protected with some cancer prevention measures (IARC, 2010). These numbers are changing recently, but most of deaths from cervical cancer are still registered in the low-resource areas of the world. Apparently, further improvements of the Pap test are necessary to make it available and affordable for global cervical cancer screening.

RESEARCH TARGETTING WOMEN’S HEALTH, CERVICAL CANCER IN PARTICULAR, SUPPORTED BY THE ACADEMY

As a part of its research activity related to the advancement of women’s health, The Academy is closely following and supporting the BioSciCon’s R&D activity on the development of MarkPap® platform technology for cervical cancer control (www.bioscicon.com). The Global Academy for Women’s Health became recently an independent affiliate of the BioSciCon’s Consortium of companies supporting the advancement and excellence in women health research within the Consortium and promoting education.

The biomarker-based MarkPap® technology has been developed to provide a low cost, fast and reliable cytological screening easily applicable to large populations particularly in low-resources areas. In addition to the first line of products (biomarker-based test, kit, collecting solution, control slides), BioSciCon developed self-sampling specimen collection kit, MarkPap® Self (See Reference 5), and automation of specimen reading and interpretation via telecytopathology, MarkPap® Digital and MarkPap® Wireless (Ref. 5,6,7). It means that, in the near future, a women can take her sample in the privacy of her home, send it to the local doctor’s office or a small lab where (with the MarkPap customer friendly kit) the sample can be processed by a low trained technician and marker-positive microscopic fields could be transmitted to professionals through telecytopathology. The transmission can be both digital and wireless, and the result may be returned within hours. Most of the unmet needs are now much more closer to be met, e.g. cost of the test, lack of infrastructure to perform Pap test, no access for testing, fear of testing, uncomfortable pelvic exam and various cultural/religious restrains to visit gynecologist.

Currently, the Academy is strongly supporting the development of a local IT Telehealth Center in Rockville, MD, that can provide million diagnostic services per year. The blue print for the Center is ready, space secured and personnel trained. The IT Telehealth Center is expecting State funds in 2011 to finish the final phase of preparation for the start. Actually, the Telehealth Center is expected to be beneficial for the local economy, in-sourcing revenues from abroad, bringing new taxes, building a new infrastructure to stay, retaining jobs and creating new jobs.

GLOBAL ACADEMY SUPPORTING EDUCATION AS AN EQUALLY IMPORTANT TOOL FOR THE SUCCESS OF THE CERVICAL CANCER PREVENTION

In order to succeed, any technology must be accompanied by education.

The Global Academy for Women’s Health, Inc. is promoting education of women as the most affordable tool against cervical cancer. The true education is based on facts and the ability to separate reality from wishful thinking. Better education on cervical cancer is a general still unmet need. Insufficient understanding of this disease may cause unexpected problems – as second epidemics. The permanent education is necessary for everybody, even for educators themselves.

To meet the educational needs, we have undertaken a serious task to prepare and publish a book on the issues related to cervical cancer. The book "What Every Woman Should Know about Cervical Cancer" was prepared by The Global Academy team and published by Springer (http://www.springer.com/biomed/cancer/book/978-1-4020-6936-9). This book, providing scientifically proven and medically correct facts should be one of these educational tools that can help women to make their own decision on this and similar dilemmas they may have about cervical cancer prevention, control diagnosis and treatment.

Members of The Global Academy team, Dr. Nenad Markovic and Dr. Olivera Markovic authored this book, which summarizes the current views of cervical cancer prevention, control, diagnosis and treatment, presenting them in a language understandable for general public. The book is aimed to bring to the readers the rationale for optimism and to provide guidance as how to gain knowledge and skills for critical thinking and making an educated decision when it will be necessary in their lives.

Click here to view the full text of the Introduction, Content and Afterward.

The book is intended to educate the general population of women about true and false information on cervical cancer, HPV infection and vaccines, responsible sexual behavior, other sexually transmitted diseases, cervical cancer detection methods, and the advantages and disadvantages of diagnostic and therapeutic methods as well as holistic medicine available to women worldwide. The purpose of this book is to improve education and reduce risk factors, to improve the awareness of cancer control measures and to improve the outreach of women participating in screening. Its purpose is also to reduce fear of unavoidable death in women who face failure or preventive measures, get cancer and are facing fight against the progress of this disease.

However, this book also teaches women about reproductive system and its function, how to increase their level of wellness across all the six dimensions of health, about strategies for stress release applied in health and disease, emphasizing the humane side the fears and despair when women get “bad” results, and where to search for help; precisely, the book is intended to stimulate women to learn more and to actively participate in their treatment--to become advocates of their own health. Authors believe that this book will become a women's companion to turn to when they are motivated to increase their wellness and become healthier, as well as when they are frightened and insecure to learn more and need to diffuse the fear. "Knowledge is power", says one contributor in the "Real People Real Stories" section of this book; she is suggesting that women must learn more to control better their lives. If you wish to read a comprehensive review on this book, please visit Springer’s or Amazon’s web sites, where the book is displayed and offered.

The Global Academy for Women's Health is planning to open an interactive page on this web site to enable readers of the book to exchange their thoughts, experience and questions. We would appreciate to hear from you whether such a page will be welcome. Please write to us via the e-mail address provided on the Contact page.