Psycho-Social Factors Influencing Cervical Cancer Screening and Human Papilloma Virus Vaccination Acceptance Among Female Civil Servants in Delta State, Nigeria

Background: Cervical cancer is the fourth most common cancer affecting women worldwide and most notable in low and middle income countries of sub-Saharan Africa. There are 528000 new cases estimated globally every year. The crude incidence rate of cervical cancer is 5.8% worldwide, 19% in West Africa, and 19.3% in Nigeria. In Nigeria, uptake of cervical cancer screening and HPV vaccination has been demonstrated in different studies to be very low, out of thirteen studies, nine show cervical cancer screening uptake of less than 5.3%. Psycho-social factors such as anxiety, stigmatization, poor health seeking behaviors and lack of family and social support among others, have been implicated. Therefore, this study assessed the psycho-social barriers to utilization of cervical cancer screening services and uptake of vaccination among female civil servants in Delta state. Aim: To assess the psycho-social factors that impede the utilization of cervical cancer screening and HPV vaccination among female civil servants in Delta state. Methods: A descriptive, cross-sectional, nonexperimental design was used for this study. Multi-stage sampling technique was used in selecting 437 women who consented, based on a calculated sample size. Thereafter, 437 self-administered structured questionnaires with a reliability coefficient of 0.7, were administered to participants, out of which 435 were retrieved. This gave a response rate of 99.5%. Data collected were analyzed with the aid of Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) using descriptive statistics and χ 2 . Results: Many participants (55.4%) knew about cervical cancer; 93.6% had never been screened for cervical cancer, while 94.7% had not vaccinated their teenage girls against human papilloma virus. Among the psycho-social factors highlighted that impeded the utilization of services were, costs of the screening tests (54.5%) and HPV vaccine (51.3%), while 58.2% reported inaccessibility. However, majority (73.6%) were willing to go for the cervical cancer screening and vaccination of their teenagers (68%). Conclusion: Cervical cancer screening and subsequent vaccination are strategies focused at ensuring reduction in the incidence of cervical cancer in the society to the barest minimum. Creating awareness about cervical cancer could be a means to help tackle the lack of knowledge issue, thereby increasing knowledge. In addition, subsidization will go a long way in lessening the financial burden, as well as increase utilization. Subsequently, global burden of cervical cancer will be reduced, with a consequent reduction in mortality.