Objectives As per the GLOBOCON 2018 data India had 96920 new cases of cervical cancer with an AAR of 14.7 per lakh population. Northeast part of India has an interesting feature of having the highest AAR of 30.2/100,000 in Papumpare district at the same time Dibrugarh district which is less than 100 miles apart has the lowest AAR of 4.9/100,000. So the epidemeological characteristics of cervical cancer is varied in this part of the country. With this background we intend to find out the appropiate screening tests which may be suitable for the region.

Methods Various screening camps were conducted and detail socio demographic records were obtained and after counselling VIA, PAP smear and Care HPV assay (Quagen) were performed on both symptomatic and asymptomatic sexually active women from 20yrs to 65 yrs of age.

Results A total of 479 patients were evaluated of which 75.3% of women were between 20 years to 49yrs, 34.2% of the women had 3 or more children. 38.2% had history of abortion, 43.5% had formal education of 10th grade or more. On screening 5.6% of women had positive VIA, 7.5% had abnormal PAP and 3.7% had positive care HPV test with normal PAP whereas 12.1% had positive Care HPV assay with abnormal PAP.

Conclusions Considering the difficult terrain of the region and looking at the final analysis of the screening tests, Care HPV triaged with VIA seemed to be a good alternative to PAP.