Cervical cancer is the second most common cancer worldwide among women in terms of frequency, behind breast cancer and tied with Colorectal Cancer. Nearly 400 000 new cases are diagnosed each year, including a large proportion of the poor, whether in countries in developing or industrialized. The standard method of detecting breast cancer, used for fifty years, is to visually examine hundreds of thousands of cells for each patient (morphological examination) in search of small variations in shape and size of cells and nuclei that signalprecancerous cells and cancer. This method is called a Pap smear, named after its inventor Dr. G. Pap `s that has developed in the 1940s. In common parlance, we speak more readily of "smear" in reference to the method of sampling cells.

Early diagnosis of cervical cancer of the uterus is `indispensable to a good prognosis. The early detection programs are therefore designed to identify women at risk and those with the earliest stages of the disease. Each year, we realize at least 140 million Pap tests in the world. The establishment of programs for prevention and early detection of morphological abnormalities of cervical cells has reduced d `70` l% incidence of cervical cancer.

Despite this considerable success, current methods of screening and diagnosis of cervical cancer have recognized limitations, resulting in an unacceptable rate of false negatives and false positives and high cost. Indeed, the current tests involve a high degree of subjectivity and does not detect direct markers of the disease.

Research papillomavirus (HPV) has recently been adopted to elucidate the results of cytology unclear or slightly abnormal (most of which are false positives) among women over 35 years. It has been demonstrated that high-risk HPV (HR-HPV) were the main etiological factor for cervical cancer `s uterus. The search of `HPV in this application is limited to a small percentage of smears. The sensitivity of the search for the `HPV disease is greater than the Pap test. That said, the high prevalence of infection with HPV `l in women (up to 25%) leads to a very low specificity (correlation between a positive test and the actual disease), which severely limits the potential clinical usefulness This early detection.

We know that `the persistence of infection with HPV high risk for several years is a causal factor of cervical cancer` s womb.

The objective of early detection of the disease should be significantly improved compared to current approaches, based on a subjective interpretation of morphologic cervical cells or on a risk assessment based on the presence of HPV`. To detect and diagnose cancer earlier cervical `s womb, it is more efficient to detect specific biomarkers that indicate the presence or absence of` this type of cancer or its precursors. mtm laboratories has identified p16INK4a as a marker potential direct and developed a family of technologies for screening and diagnosis based on this biomarker. The techniques of diagnosis and early detection based on this marker promise a safe and accurate diagnosis of the disease. The diagnostic kits of mtm laboratories use the E6H4TM antibodies, highly selective and sensitive to the presence of p16INK4a, whose value has been demonstrated clinically. Unlike other possible antibodies, detection with E6H4TM shows no cross reactivity with Trichomonas (Protozoa causing vaginal infections), which causes an excessive number of false positives and rendered the antibody in question.