Importance of the screening
In Morocco, breast and cervix cancers constitute a burning issue for the public health. They are the most frequent as they represent approximately half of the cancers affecting the women and are in general diagnosed in very late stages, thus delaying their therapeutic care and complicating their cure.
Since the implementation of the NCPCP in 2010, national-scale operations of breast cancer screening are regularly carried out everywhere throughout the Kingdom, whilst that of the cervix cancer is fully operational in six regions but will be widened to all the Basic Healthcare Centers by five years at the very latest.
Furthermore, early diagnosis services for these two cancers are already available in all the reference centers of reproductive health.
To date, all the types of treatments (chemotherapy, radiotherapy and surgery) have been standardized by formal procedures and are equally provided in the different oncology centers.
Screening tests and core target people
The Moroccan programs of early screening set up the clinical breast examination and the cervical visual inspection with acetic acid as the screening tests to be used in breast and cervix cancers early detection. They are receivable, reliable and not that expensive.
The catchment population for the breast cancer screening is the group of women between 45 and 69 years old, as well as the women having breast cancer cases in their family history (grandmother, mother, aunt, sister). Are excluded from the program the women who already passed through breast cancer. To be totally safe and protected against breast cancer, every woman should redo the breast screening every year, or at least every other year if the result of the previous test is negative.
The target population for the cervix cancer screening concerns all the 30-year-old women till at least over 49 years old. The pregnant women from the 8th week as well as those who already passed through cervix cancer are prohibited from screening. The aim of such screening is to detect the precancerous lesions if any, to treat these lesions as soon as possible and to eliminate hence the risk of a cervix cancer appearance. To be totally safe and protected against breast cancer, women must redo the cervical screening every three years provided that the result of the previous test was negative.