Importance of Regular Checkups Stressed During Gynecologic Cancer Awareness Month

Highlights Growing Need for Access to Affordable, Preventive Reproductive Health Care In recognition of Gynecologic Cancer Awareness Month, Planned Parenthood Arizona is encouraging women to visit health care providers to receive basic, preventive cervical cancer screenings and treatments to help save their lives. These tough economic times are especially difficult for women who are struggling to pay for basic health care. According to the Women's Research and Education Institute, women of childbearing age spend 68 percent more in out-of-pocket health care costs than men, in part because of reproductive health care needs. A recent survey conducted for the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists found that women are delaying their annual exams as a result of the economic downturn. And a Kaiser Family Foundation report shows roughly 16.7 million women are uninsured, and thus likely to postpone care and delay or forgo important preventive care such as cancer screenings. In Arizona, up to 60 percent of women diagnosed with cervical cancer die as a result of the disease; however, with early diagnosis and proper treatment, the cervical cancer five-year survival rate is 92 percent. Planned Parenthood Arizonas health centers offer preventive reproductive health care, including routine cervical cancer screenings and the HPV (Human Papillomavirus) vaccine, which protects against the types of HPV that cause most cervical, vaginal and vulvar cancers.