National Cervical Screening Programme

The National Cervical Screening Programme is delivered by a large number of providers across the screening pathway, from health promotion to treatment.

The National Screening Unit contracts seven independent service providers to provide health promotion to Maori, Pacific and other women in the Auckland, Hamilton, Wellington and Christchurch regions. Across the country there are approximately 5,300 smear takers, including general practitioners and nurses and nine laboratories providing cytology services to the National Cervical Screening Programme.

The 21 District Health Boards (DHBs) are contracted by the National Screening Unit to provide colposcopy services. Thirteen of the 21 DHBs have been contracted to provide the NCSP regional services. All NCSP regional services undertake the regional co-ordination role and six are responsible for the management and operation of the NCSP-Register.

The four components of the NCSP service delivery model currently delivered by the NCSP Regional Services are:

management and operation of the NCSP-Register
regional coordination and liaison activities, that are directly supported by the NCSP-Register, particularly with other providers (eg, smear takers and colposcopy units)
NCSP health promotion
provision of smear-taking services for women in priority groups.

From the early 1990s coinciding with the introduction of the NCSP, incidence decreased from about 12 per 100,000 in 1991 to below 7 per 100,000 in 2002, a steady decline of approximately 40 percent. Between 1990 and 2001, mortality fell from 5 per 100,000 to 2 per 100,000 a decline of 60 percent.