Other tests -- such as a Pap smear for cervical cancer or a lymph node biopsy for lymphoma -- are also safe.

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Professor Kimler said the test was similar to the Pap smear, which is used to detect the early signs of cervical cancer.

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Cervical polyps are typically removed only if they are large, causing irregular bleeding, or if there is an abnormal Pap smear or a persistently positive HPV (human papillomavirus) test.

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"Not being greatly educated, it sounded like a lot of money to me, for someone who just needed a mammogram every year and a pap smear and nothing else, " she says.

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She put off a routine mammogram and pap smear.

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Even a casual reader of newspapers must be aware that there is considerable debate about when and how often people should get mammograms, Pap smear tests, PSA tests, and other cancer screenings.

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Apart from the silliness, there is a great deal of useful health advice here, with articles on everything from what to do if your PAP smear test comes back "abnormal" to the health benefits of fennel.

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Second, as I feared, the seating position puts the rider's weight on the tail of the sled, rendering the steering runner useless that is, unless you shimmy your butt forward, knees up, like you're having a 40-mph Pap smear.

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But only one in a thousand of those in fact have a malignancy and are destined to die from it. (Most of the 4, 000 deaths per year from cervical cancer are in women who either never had a Pap smear or missed having one in the five years before a cancer diagnosis.) Over their lifetimes, 40% of women get a false alarm Pap.

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