NEW CAMPAIGN TO ANSWER YOUR QUESTIONS ABOUT LGBTIQ CERVICAL SCREENING
A new social media campaign aims to keep LGBTIQ communities talking about the importance of regular cervical screening. LGBTIQ&A: Your questions, answered by The Inner Circle is the second phase of the successful The Inner Circle campaign, launched earlier this year by NSW's leading LGBTI health organisation, ACON.
The Inner Circle campaign and website focuses on raising awareness about the changes to the National Cervical Screening Program, encourages all people with a cervix to get screened, and addresses some of the barriers LGBTIQ people may face in accessing testing. Funded by a Cancer Screening and Prevention grant from Cancer Institute NSW, the campaign is one of very few in the world that recognises the diversity of people who have a cervix, and is inclusive of trans and gender diverse people.
"We know that people in our communities often face barriers when accessing heath care and that the Cervical Screening Test – which has replaced the Pap test – can be particularly daunting. The first phase of the campaign was about addressing those barriers and getting people talking about cervical cancer prevention," ACON Deputy CEO Karen Price said.
"Now we're focusing on making sure our communities have the knowledge they need to understand the test, the reasons behind the changes to the National Cervical Screening Program, and how important it is to stay up to date with screening."
Educating communities about the changes to the national program is an important priority for the Cancer Institute NSW, says Sarah McGill, Director of Cancer Screening and Prevention.
"The new Cervical Screening Test is a much more accurate than the old Pap Test, as it looks for the presence of HPV – human papilloma virus – which causes 99.7% of cervical cancers. Since we're looking for the source of the cellular changes that can lead to cancer, we'll be catching potential problems much earlier. This means the time between screening has been extended from every two years to every five years for those who don't have HPV.
"These changes can be really confusing for some people – particularly the idea that the new test is more accurate, which means we can test less often," McGill said. "We know that accurate information and sharing knowledge is one of the most powerful ways we can reduce anxiety about testing and encourage people to take control of their health."
The new campaign features 10 short videos which will be released through ACON's social media pages across December and into January.
ACON sourced frequently asked questions about cervical screening directly from the community, including from clients at
