The National Cervical Screening Programme, which was set up in 1990, aims to reduce the number of women in New Zealand who develop cervical cancer and the number who die from it.

The National Screening Unit is responsible for organising the programme, which includes health promotion, smear taking, laboratory analysis of cervical smears, cervical biopsies and management of women with abnormal smear results.

Many women in the community contributed to the development of the National Cervical Screening Programme. The programme acknowledges the importance of the Treaty of Waitangi in providing a screening programme that is successful for all New Zealand women. There has been significant involvement of Māori women in the development of the programme.  Pacific women have also been involved in the development of the National Cervical Screening Programme.

Regional co-ordination of the National Cervical Screening Programme is managed through thirteen Regional Services who link to a single national register, the National Cervical Screening Programme-Register.

How do you enrol in the programme?

All cervical screening results are forwarded to the programme and all women are enrolled unless they write a letter to the programme or complete a 'withdraw from the programme' form.  For further information about enrolment in the NCSP, call freepone 0800 729 729.

How do you withdraw from the programme?

A woman can decide at any time that she does not want to take part in the programme and withdraw by filling in a Withdraw from the Programme form or writing to the programme. For futher information, contact the programme on freephone 0800 729 729.

When a woman withdraws, the programme is required to keep background details. These are name, date of birth, National Health Index (NHI) number (if known), address and ethnicity. This allows the programme to correctly identify a woman who does not wish to take part in the programme. This reduces the risk of future results being accidently added to the NCSP-Register. The programme will also retain ethnicity details to help make decisions on how programmes can be improved. The programme is required to destroy all other electronic information, along with any paper records, unless a woman asks for these to be returned to her.

When a woman withdraws from the programme, she and her smear taker are responsible for her cervical screening. The programme will not follow up her smear results or track her smear history.

A woman who withdraws is welcome to re-enrol at any time by filling in a Re-enrol in the Programme form or writing to the programme. If a woman re-enrols, her screening history will begin with her most recent smear.

Forms to download:

Withdraw from the Programme form

Re-enrol in the Programme form

Monitoring the programme

Independent monitoring is one of several systems the National Screening Unit uses to ensure its programmes are working well.  Information on independent monitoring of the National Cervical Screening Programme can be found on the NCSP Monitoring Reports page.