Cervical cancer is one of female gynecological cancer that causes high morbidity especially in developing countries. It is a preventable disease that can be identified early through screening but the uptake of screening is low in developing countries, Nigeria inclusive. This study assessed uptake of cervical cancer screening and associated factors among women attending selected government owned hospital in Abuja, Nigeria. Descriptive research design was employed and simple random technique was used to select 224 respondents. Questionnaire with reliability index of 0.737 was used as instrument for data collection. The data collected were analyzed using SPSS package. Descriptive statistics of frequencies and percentages was used and results were presented in tables. The outcome of the study shows that 93.8% of the respondents have heard about cervical cancer preventive strategies and only 45.1% had utilized it. The factors identified to influence the uptake of cervical cancer screening services in this study were knowledge and awareness about cervical cancer screening services, affordability, fear of having a positive result, women’s level of education, non recommendation of screening by health workers and accessibility of Hospitals for screening. It is therefore recommended that cervical cancer screening should be made accessible and affordable. Women should be educated on the importance of screening and not to be afraid of positive results.
Keywords: Uptake, Women, cancer screening, cervical cancer
