Use of the Vaginal Smear as a Screening Test

Abstract

A LONG-RANGE experimental study, financed in part by the Commonwealth Fund, was inaugurated in January, 1945, by the Massachusetts Department of Public Health to evaluate, from an administrative standpoint, the use of vaginal smears in the diagnosis of uterine cancer. At that time the test was just beginning to be generally known and enthusiasm for its utilization was increasing.^{1 2 3 4 5} Several lay periodicals were soon to advocate the universal examination of women by this test. The Department desired to determine whether the cytology test for cancer should be added to the other services offered to physicians and the public, whether the . . .