Abstract
BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: Screening of rural women of Assam by careHPV test for high-risk HPV (hr-HPV) DNA and Papanicolaou (PAP) test for abnormal cytology. METHOD: This prospective cross-sectional study included 480 non-pregnant women participants aged 20-70 years from Kamrup District, Assam. Two cervical scrap samples were obtained from eligible enrolled women. The Hr-HPV DNA test by CareHPV was performed with one cervical scrap, and a second cervical scrap sample was used for the Papanicolaou (PAP) test. The statistical analysis was done using RStudio for variables. A p-value < 0.05 was considered to be statistically significant. RESULTS: Women having positive hr-HPV DNA outcomes were 3.33% (16/480) and 7.7% (37/480) women had positive PAP. Tobacco chewing was significantly associated with positive hr-HPV DNA (p = 0.04) and positive PAP (p = 0.03) status. Alcohol-consuming women have a significantly higher risk of positive hr-HPV DNA (p < 0.00001) and positive PAP (p-0.04) outcomes. Irregular menstruation (p = 0.004) and urogenital tract infection (p = 0.008) also have significant risk for a positive hr-HPV DNA status. The positive hr-HPV DNA status was also significant in women having > 3 numbers of children birth (p = 0.003). CONCLUSION: We found that the positive hr-HPV DNA status among rural women in Kamrup, Assam, was significantly associated with alcohol consumption, tobacco chewing, irregular menstruation, urogenital tract infection, and more than three children birth. The abnormal cytology outcome was also substantially associated with tobacco chewing and alcohol consumption.