A local doctor hopes new guidelines for pap smears do not keep women from visiting their obstetrician/gynecologist for yearly checkups.

Dr. Bob Wetzel, an obstetrician/gynecologist whose office is based in Martins Ferry, said he does not disagree with new guidelines recently presented by the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists.

The new guidelines recommend women not receive their first pap smear - a test to screen for cervical cancer - until age 21 unless they are already sexually active. Also, women younger than age 30 should receive the test every two years.

And women 30 years old and older should be screened every three years, as long as they've already had three consecutive clean screenings for cervical cancer. It was previously recommended that women receive pap smears yearly.

Wetzel hopes, however, that women do not take the new recommendations to mean that they don't need to see their ObGyn on annual basis.

"The pap smear recommendations are pretty logical," Wetzel said. "The problem is most see their ObGyn yearly anyway. We do more than pap smears."

Yearly checkups, he said, involve monitoring a woman's use of birth control, STD prevention, blood pressure and other preventive medicine. Some women, he noted, use their ObGyn as their primary care physician.

Wetzel said he may adopt the group's recommendations, though it will depend on a patient's history.

Cervical cancer, he said, is rare for younger women. For example, last year there were 14 cases of cervical cancer in women age 20 and younger. He also noted cervical cancer is a slow-growing cancer.