Total Uterine Sampling

Abstract

MOST gynecologists agree that early cervical cancer is rarely visualized in clinical practice. The early phase in the history of the disease is preclinical. The vaginal smear has presented abundant evidence of this concept. Papanicolaou,^{1 , 2} Meigs,³ Jones⁴ and others have reported cancer cells in vaginal secretions in women whose cervixes appeared clinically normal. Traut⁵ has insisted, with good reason, that the vaginal smear represents the most valuable clinical test in the armamentarium of the gynecologist. Few gynecologists order vaginal smears on patients whose cervixes look normal, and yet the most important positive findings come from this group. Ayre⁶ has pointed . . .