If you developed cervical cancer after screening you can request a personal cervical screening review.
A review may help you or your family if you:
- are looking for answers or ways to understand how and when your cancer developed
- want to ask questions about your screening experience
You will find information about how to request a review in the leaflets we send you when we:
- invite you for screening
- send you your screening result
We are updating these leaflets to include information on screening reviews.
Who can ask for a review
You can only request a review if you have cervical cancer and:
- had a CervicalCheck screening test in the 10 years before your diagnosis
- have not had a previous review related to the CervicalCheck programme, for example, a CervicalCheck audit review or a Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists (RCOG) review
We will not be able to offer you a review if you:
- do not have cervical cancer
- had a previous review related to the CervicalCheck programme, for example, a CervicalCheck clinical audit RCOG review
If you’re not sure when your last CervicalCheck screening test before your diagnosis was, you can:
- email review.request@screeningservice.ie
- Freephone 1800 45 45 55
What is a CervicalCheck screening test
A CervicalCheck screening test is a test taken through Ireland’s CervicalCheck programme - from September 2008.
It does not include cervical tests:
- you had done privately (paid-for tests)
- taken under the mid-west Irish Cervical Screening Programme
- taken outside of the Republic of Ireland
How to request a review
Contact us by email or post to ask for a review.
Email: review.request@screeningservice.ie
National Screening Service,
King’s Inns House,
200 Parnell St,
Freepost FDN7612,
Dublin 1,
DO1 A3Y8
What to expect
After you ask for a review we will get in touch with you to let you know if you are eligible.
We will meet you before the review starts and at the end of the process.
There are 4 parts to the review:
- how we invited you to screening
- your screening test results
- your colposcopy care
- your histology (biopsy) results
We will look at the parts that are relevant in your case and:
- compare your care against the quality assurance standards at the time
- tell you if there was anything we could have done differently
Meeting with you
To fully understand your experience, we would like to speak to you directly as part of the review process.
We will accommodate your needs as much as possible. For example, when and where we meet or if you need to change the meeting time, date or location.
We recommend you bring a friend or family member with you to these meetings for support.
Introductory meeting
In the first meeting, you can tell us about your screening experience. We will also take you through what to expect from the review process.
You will meet members of our team who specialise in screening.
We may not be able to answer all of your questions until your review is complete. Knowing your questions will help us to focus the review on what matters to you.
Review results meeting
In the second meeting, we will:
- go through the results of your review
- answer your questions
- go through the next steps
We will send you your review report within 5 days of the second meeting.
Someone to support you
You might need independent support to help you through the review.
This could be:
- a member of your family
- a close friend
- a carer
- an independent advocate
Choose someone who:
- you are comfortable with and can talk to easily
- can come with you to meetings, if needed
- we can share your personal information with
Patient Advocacy Service
You can get support and an advocate through the Patient Advocacy Service. It is free and fully independent.
After you request a review
After we get your letter or email asking for a review, we will contact you.
Before your review starts
If you are eligible for a review we will:
- ask you to confirm your identity - to make sure we protect the privacy of people who use our services
- give you the contact details of the person who will be your point of contact during your review - you can contact them at any stage during the review
- ask you for your consent to access your relevant medical records
Consent for medical records
We may need to access your relevant medical records to do the review. These are different to your National Screening Service records.
Hospitals hold your medical records. We need your consent to access them.
We need to look at your medical records to make sure we have the relevant information to go ahead with your request for a review.
Your medical records
Your medical records include:
- colposcopy notes - these are notes the doctors and nurses made if you attended colposcopy
- histology (biopsy) records - these include samples taken from your cervix and reports on these samples if you attended colposcopy
- notes from multidisciplinary team meetings - meetings doctors held if they met to talk about the best way forward for your case
Within 3 months of receiving your permission we will write to you. We will let you know if your records show that we can do a review.
How we use your personal information
If we cannot do a review
If your medical records show a reason why we cannot do a review, we will write to you to tell you why.
Your personal cervical screening review
We will:
- Let you know we are starting the review and invite you to an introductory meeting - ideally within 3 months of getting your permission to look at your medical records.
- Do a review of your case and write a report - ideally within 12 months of your first meeting.
- Meet you to give you your report and discuss it with you - ideally within 3 months of completing your review.
If there is a delay we will let you know.
Report on your screening history
In your personal cervical screening review we look at your screening history to see if there is anything we could have done differently.
We will write a report as part of the review.
It will say if your care was satisfactory, satisfactory within limitations or unsatisfactory in these 4 areas:
What happens when we look back at your slides
We know what to expect from reviews done by other countries.
For every 100 screening slides taken from women who have developed cervical cancer we can expect to find about:
- 60 of the slides will have a review result that is ‘satisfactory’
- 35 will have a result of ‘satisfactory within limitations’ - the screener did not detect difficult-to-find pre-cancer abnormalities on their slide
- 5 will have a result of ‘unsatisfactory’ - the screener did not detect obvious pre-cancer abnormalities on their slide
If your slide should have been read differently
For every 100 slides reviewed, we expect to find that around 5 slides should have been read differently.
This means that a small number of women will be told that an error was made in the reading of their slide.
This can be devastating news to hear.
When this happens our clinical review team will listen to and respond to all your questions. We will talk to you about your concerns.
Patient safety incident
We will let you know as part of your review results meeting if we find that there was a patient safety incident.
If we find during the review that there was a patient safety incident, we will:
- examine what happened
- report it
We do this in line with the:
Impact of your screening review on your care
The result of your review will not affect past or ongoing decisions made about your care.
You may have questions about whether your care would have been different if a different result was given in the past. We will do our best to answer any questions you have in an open and transparent way.