Background Cervical cancer is the second commonest female cancer in Sri Lanka. Two major drawbacks of the present cervical cancer screening programme are the suboptimal sensitivity of the pap smear and the low coverage. The objective of the study is to determine the feasibility of a new HPV/DNA test among 35 -years -old ever-married women in a district of Sri Lanka. Method A community based descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted from 1stof July 2018 to 30th November 2018 in the public health divisions called Medical Officer of Health (MOH) areas of Kalutara district. The study population is comprised of ever-married women 35 years of age. Three women from each cluster (n = 413) were selected by consecutive sampling. A total of 918 women were recruited. HPV/DNA cervical specimen collection (n = 822) was carried out. Cervical specimens were tested by two cytoscreeners with the cobas 4800 PCR based screening machine. Clients’ perceptions and prevalence were assessed. The follow-up of women with positive HPV/DNA screening results was carried out. The operational and technical feasibility of the screening test were assessed. Data entry was done by using the statistical package IBM SPSS version 20. Results Overall response rate was 91.1% (n = 836). Clients’ perception was highly positive for HPV/DNA screening test procedure (99.9%, n = 821) and 99.6% (n = 819) of clients had mentioned that the HPV/DNA screening test is worthwhile to be incorporated into the National Cervical Cancer Screening program. The prevalence of HPV was 6.2% (95%CI: 6.18–6.22%). The coverage of the HPV/DNA screening was 89.5%(n = 822). Invalid results reported were 0.12% (n = 1). The percentage of HPV/DNA test positive women who underwent pap test within 3 months of the initial screening was 100% (n = 51), while the percentage of women who attempted to get a colposcopy within the 1 month of referral was 86.7% (n = 13). Conclusions HPV/DNA test implementation as a primary cervical cancer screening method is feasible among the 35- year age cohort of ever- married women in Kalutara district. It is necessary to further attempt alternative methods of cobas 4800 HPV/DNA test, which would be much suitable for resource-limited settings.

Introduction: Selenium (Se) may have a protective effect against some selected cancers. Ovarian cancer is ranked as one of the major killers of all gynecological malignancies worldwide. The objective of this study is to find the relationship between selenium intake and Epithelial Ovarian Cancer risk in women who have not had an oophorectomy. Methods: A comprehensive electronic search was carried out according to the prepared strategy from the starting date of the PubMed/Medline, EMBASE, Scopus, Proquest, and Web of Science databases up to 30th of September 2022 without limitations related to language and publication status. Studies were screened by COVIDENCE. Cohort studies, case-control studies, cross-sectional analytical studies, ecological studies, and randomized control studies were included, and descriptive studies were excluded from the systematic review. The exposure of interest is high selenium intake from either food sources or supplements and also high measures of selenium in blood, toenails, or other biological samples, and high measures of serum selenoproteins. Data extraction will be done. New Castle Ottawa Scale will be used to assess the bias of observational studies. The findings will be synthesized first via a narrative description. If data permits results will be displayed via forest plots. All analyses will be conducted using STATA-17. Discussion: Ovarian cancer is the most fatal gynecological malignancy among women. Due to the lack of recommended screening tools, the identification of modifiable effective risk factors and preventive tools are essential to reduce ovarian cancer burden. Selenium is a powerful antioxidant, therefore it prevents cell damage. It was proven in some studies that selenium protects against the development of some selected cancers. Therefore it is envisaged to find whether there is an inverse relationship between selenium and ovarian cancer for future preventive strategies. Systematic review registration: Registered in the International Prospective Register of Systematic Reviews (PROSPERO)- CRD42022356472

Breakfast is a meal eaten in the morning and at the first of the day. Failure to eat a well-balanced diet in the morning has been documented to have a deleterious impact on the health such as nutritional disorders, non-communicable diseases and failure to cognitive performance. Ayurveda texts mentioned that consuming food in the morning enhance memory power, life span, energy, complexion, and lustre. The objective of the present study was to study the relationship between breakfast and BMI values. Fifty cases of male and female, between 20 and 60 years were randomly selected from OPD in Ayurveda Teaching Hospital, Borella, Sri Lanka. The relationship between breakfasts with BMI was evaluated. Socio-demographic characteristics such as age, gender, religion, ethnicity, occupation, monthly income, residential area and education were gathered through a questionnaire. BMI was measured and that was compared with information related to breakfast as a morning drink, type of food consumption, skipping breakfast, veg food habits and time having breakfast. Statistical analyses were performed using SPSS, version 17.0. Mean age of the study population was 42 years in which 58% were females. According to BMI values, 6% underweight, 42% normal weight and 52% were overweight respectively. When comparing breakfast habits with BMI categories, there was no significant relationship with milk as a morning drink, rice and curry as a morning diet, vegetarian food, skipping breakfast (p>0.05). Consumption of tea as a morning drink which was significantly related with BMI values (p=0.023) as well as taking refined wheat flour product as a morning diet, having breakfast at 6.00 am to 9.00 am were significantly related with BMI (p=0.017 and p=0.020, respectively). The study indicated that the drinking tea, consumption of refined wheat flour product and time of the taking breakfast were significantly related with BMI.

Background: HPV/DNA screening can be used as a primary cervical cancer screening method. The objective of the study was to describe colposcopy results of HPV/DNA screen positive women according to the Asia-Oceania guidelines of follow-up. Method: Descriptive longitudinal study was conducted from 1st of September 2018 to 28th of February 2020 from women, who were undergone for HPV/DNA screening under the pilot project carried out in public health divisions called Medical officer of Health (MOH) areas in Kalutara district. Study population comprised of 35 and 45 year age cohort ever married women in MOH areas of Kalutara district. HPV/DNA screen positive women with cytology results ≥ Atypical Squamous Cells of Undete rmined Significance (≥ASCUS) were referred to colposcopy. T otal number of 106 women were referred to FHB colposcopy clinic. Total number of 95 women were subjected to biopsy and biopsy screening was carried out by a machine by the Consultant Histopathologist. Results: Percentage of biopsy tissue abnormality among overall HPV/DNA screen positive women with cytology ≥ASCUS was 81.05% (77/95). Percentage of biopsy tissue abnormality among HPV/DNA genotypes 16 and 18 screen positive women with cytology ≥ASCUS was 92.7% (51/55). Percentage of women subjected to biopsy following abnormal colposcopy results was 89.6% (95/106). Among all biopsy screened 4.6% (5/95) were cervical cancer, 8% (8/95) were High Grade Squamous Intraepithelial Lesions (HGSIL) and 67.36% were Low Grade Squamous Intraepithelial Lesions (LGSIL) (64/95). Conclusions: Colposcopy and biopsy of HPV/DNA screen positive follow-up has revealed a very high detection rate of Cervical Intraepithelial Neoplasia (CIN). Therefore, HPV/DNA screening as a primary cervical cancer screening method should be considered as it is suitability was well assessed at Sri-Lankan setting.

Conclusion The study suggests the association of hMR in sexual transmission of HIV. Presence of hMR in lower number of vaginal epithelial cells of Serodiscordant females prevented binding and HIV entry into these cells.