Toward the Next Stage of Cytological Diagnosis

It is my pleasure to announce that the 66th Annual Spring Meeting of the Japanese Society of Clinical Cytology will be held at the Keio Plaza Hotel Tokyo in Shinjuku from Friday, June 27 to Sunday, June 29, 2025. Although the meeting will be primarily held onsite, we will also offer on-demand streaming of educational lectures and requested lectures for those who wish to view them at a later date or repeatedly.

With primary HPV testing being introduced as a cervical cancer screening method from April 2024, the approach to cytological diagnosis is undergoing a major shift. When a patient tests positive for HPV during primary HPV testing, a follow-up cytological diagnosis is performed using an LBC sample. This marks a significant change in direction for clinicians, who have conventionally focused on finding HPV-infected cells via cytological diagnosis. At the meeting, we therefore aim to revisit the fundamentals of diagnostic techniques for cytological diagnosis in cervical cancer screening, including primary HPV testing, and establish guidelines as a Society.

Cytological diagnosis has also become an integral method in the treatment of pancreatic and breast cancer—not only in the diagnosis of these diseases, but also in determining the area to be excised. Furthermore, with the addition of genomic diagnosis, the field of cytological diagnosis is approaching a new stage. Against this backdrop, we have titled the meeting Toward the Next Stage of Cytology. In this way, we hope that this meeting will serve as a stepping stone for cytological diagnosis to achieve a leap forward to the next stage.

We cordially invite you to participate in this special event, and look forward to hosting an engaging and productive meeting.