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Medical and health sciences
- Cancer epidemiology
- Cancer prevention
Cervical cancer can be eliminated as a public health problem by identifying precancerous lesions early. However, screening programmes are only effective if abnormal screening results received timely follow-up. In Flanders, 20% of abnormal screening are not followed-up timely. Evidence demonstrates that inadequate diagnostic follow-up of is associated with lower socio-economic position. It is unknown if these social inequalities are also present in Flanders. Since 2019, the Flemish screening programme aims to increase timely follow-up through a strategy directed to the health care provider while evidence suggests that a women-oriented strategy might be effective as well. As inadequate follow-up might be associated with socio-economic characteristics, involvement of women without timely follow-up might be the key to success to develop an effective strategy. The aims of this project are to 1) investigate if social inequalities in timely follow-up are present in Flanders, to 2) to evaluate whether the health-care-oriented strategy of the Flemish screening programme had an impact on potentially existing disparities and 3) to evaluate the feasibility of a cocreated intervention to increase timely follow-up in Flanders. This study will allow to identify women who are at risk for inadequate follow-up from a socio-economic perspective and will provide the necessary ground work for randomised-controlled trial in which a newly intervention can be tested for its effectiveness.