Women who use intrauterine devices for birth control may have a lower risk of cervical cancer, according to a new review and meta-analysis. In a new study published yesterday (November 8) in the journal Obstetrics and Gynecology, researchers found that women who use an intrauterine device (IUD) have a lower incidence of cervical cancer than those who do not. One-third lower among women using IUDs.
The researchers caution that because this review does not include clinical work to determine how IUDs prevent cervical cancer, study lead author Victoria Cotter, an epidemiologist at the Keck School of Medicine of USC, The results don't mean people should get cancer-preventing devices, Si said. "[10 Dos and Don'ts to Reduce Your Risk of Cancer]," Cortessis told Live Science. "But this finding is astonishing." ","
"," I think what we're prepared to say is that if "IUDs did reduce the risk of cervical cancer, that pattern is what you'd expect," Cortessis said. "It looks like." Very true. It smells great, but to be truly convincing, we need to go back and do research to find a mechanism.
The researchers say they now plan to study the mechanisms by which IUDs may reduce the incidence of cervical cancer.
Cervical cancer is almost always caused by certain strains of human papillomavirus (HPV), according to the World Health Organization. But Cortes said only 1 in 10 women infected with HPV will develop cervical cancer. Cortessis speculates that this happens when the body's immune system is unable to kill HPV and the viral infection persists, eventually leading to cervical cancer.
Intrauterine devices may reduce a woman's risk of cervical cancer by helping to fight off HPV infection. She said that when an IUD is inserted, it triggers an immune response in the body that "drives away" the HPV infection. Another possible mechanism could be a long-term immune response, she said. Over time, the immune system develops a response to the foreign material in the IUD, and this immune response may also target the human tumor virus, Cortessis said.
In the meta-analysis, researchers looked at 16 studies that included more than 12,000 women from around the world. All studies included data on individual women, IUD use, and history of cervical cancer. Eduardo Franco, director of cancer epidemiology at McGill University in Montreal, said the study also included information on risk factors for the disease, such as age at first sexual intercourse and whether the woman had HPV.
The methods used by the researchers were "very good," Franco said in an interview with Live Science. The WHO was not involved in the new study.
Confounding variables—or factors that researchers cannot control—have long been a concern in studies of IUDs and cervical cancer. He said that despite the analysis of confounding variables and the robustness of the size of the review, there will be concerns about the persistence of confounding variables before clinical studies are conducted.
Cortessis agreed that confounding variables are A limitation of meta-analysis. But regardless of how the data related to those variables, the researchers found the same result, she said: IUD users had a one-third lower rate of cervical cancer than non-users.
"It's shocking, actually," Cortessis said.
Get prevention ***, such as cervical cancer screening and HPV vaccines, which are reducing cancer rates in some parts of the world but increasing them in others, according to this review. The researchers note that IUDs appear to have the greatest impact on those women who have less access to these services. For these women, Cortessis said she hopes clinical studies will corroborate her analysis "for those women who are most vulnerable to these services." Women who need it," she said. If we don't find something in the next few decades, rates will surge to help young ladies be very, very influential.
Originally published in the journal Life Sciences.