By The Numbers

Here’s how I spent the afternoon two weeks ago before the rest of the group arrived: me, my book, and a mango/pineapple/coconut smoothie in a beautiful little restaurant in Flores.  I actually spent most of the day catching up on email, work, and preparations for the arrival of the group, but I couldn’t resist a little relaxation (and this photo op). 

Pretty far cry from the first 4 weeks I spent here.  After taking a little bit of a reprieve, I spent some time over the last couple days with the data and figured I’d share some of it with you.  Keep in mind, these numbers are still rough and based on an incomplete data set at this time.  Nonetheless, they’re pretty interesting.  (At least I think so.) 

• Total paps: 1056
• Total number of abnormals: 96 (9%)
• 14 possible cancer (squamous cell or adenocarcinoma)
• 41 mildly abnormal (ASCUS)
• 15 low-grade (LGSIL)
• 17 high-grade (HGSIL)
• VIAA (see this post for more info)
• 11.4% positive
• 13.8% unsatisfactory
• This shows one of the limits of VIAA because when you can’t adequately visualize the whole transformation zone (postmenopausal women, obese women, etc.) then you should call the VIAA unsatisfactory…  if this is the main screening method, then what do you do? 
• I didn’t take the time to do any real statistical analysis of VIAA because I want to wait for the full results, but it’s easy to see that there are a lot of positive paps with positive VIAAs and also a lot of positive paps with normal VIAAs (see this post for my frustration with VIAA). 
• Total number of (hopefully curative) treatments: 36
• 24 cryo
• 12 LEEP
• Other interesting stuff (based on data from about 350 women):
• Average age: 38.5
• Youngest: 17 years old (we tried to limit to 25 and older, but about 30 younger ones slipped in by oversight or persuasion)
• Oldest: 86 years old
• Pregnancy history
• Average number of pregnancies: 5.33
• Highest: 17 pregnancies
• Average number of living children: 4.42 (others lost to miscarriage or death after birth)
• % with 6 or more: 39.4%
• % with 11 or more: 11.5%
• Average number of children that died after birth: 0.40
• For patients with at least one that died, average number: 1.60
• Largest number of children that died: 8
• % with at least one child that died: 24.9%
• Deliveries
• % with all deliveries at hospital: 21.6%
• % with all deliveries at home: 45.4%
• % without electricity: 204/568 = 35.9%