Ask your doctor whether an HPV vaccine is appropriate for you. Receiving a vaccination to prevent HPV infection may reduce your risk of cervical cancer and other HPV-related cancers. Ask your doctor about the HPV vaccine.
If your mother took a drug called diethylstilbestrol (DES) while pregnant in the 1950s, you may have an increased risk of a certain type of cervical cancer called clear cell adenocarcinoma.
The type of cervical cancer that you have helps determine your prognosis and treatment. This means other factors - such as your environment or your lifestyle choices - also determine whether you'll develop cervical cancer. HPV is very common, and most people with the virus never develop cancer. It isn't clear what causes cervical cancer, but it's certain that HPV plays a role. Cancer cells invade nearby tissues and can break off from a tumor to spread (metastasize) elsewhere in the body. The accumulating abnormal cells form a mass (tumor). The mutations tell the cells to grow and multiply out of control, and they don't die. Healthy cells grow and multiply at a set rate, eventually dying at a set time. A cell's DNA contains the instructions that tell a cell what to do. The boundary between the two types of cells is where cervical cancer most commonly occurs.Ĭervical cancer begins when healthy cells in the cervix develop changes (mutations) in their DNA. The other type (squamous cells) is thin and flat. One type (glandular cells) has a column-shaped appearance. Two types of cells line the surface of the cervix, and both can become cancerous.