Abstract
Background: Cervical cancer remains a global public health concern occurring in most cases in developing countries. Furthermore, it is a highly preventable disease; it remains to be the most common cancer among Nepalese women. Assessing women's awareness of cervical cancer and identifying barriers to screening are of vital importance for the utilization of cervical cancer screening. Therefore, this study has been conducted to assess information regarding awareness, practice, and barriers to cervical cancer screening among the women of Kageshwori Manohara Municipality of Kathmandu district in Nepal. Methods: Community-based descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted among 249 women aged 30-60 years by using a systematic random sampling technique. Data were collected from 1st to 29th February 2024 through a self-constructed semistructured tool using a face-to-face interview technique. Descriptive statistics and the chi-square tests were used for statistical analysis. Results: Out of the total respondents, only 10.4% had adequate awareness regarding cervical cancer screening and 38.6% of the respondents had ever been screened for cervical cancer. Among the respondents who had ever been screened, the majority (86.5%) of their last time screening was within 5 years. A statistically significant association was found between levels of awareness with the age of the respondents (p=0.031), educational level (p=0.013), and number of children (p=0.003). However, no significant association was found with other variables such as age at marriage, ethnicity, occupation, and monthly family income. Absence of symptoms (54.6%), unaware of screening (17.7%), and feeling of embarrassment (11.6%) were the most mentioned barriers to practicing cervical cancer screening among the respondents. Conclusion: The result of this study showed most of the respondents had an inadequate level of awareness and low experience of practicing cervical cancer screening. Therefore, community-based awareness campaigns and screening health camps should be conducted to increase knowledge and practice of cervical cancer screening.