What is the difference between a PAP test and a vaginal examination?

Question

has anyone had either of these?

Answer 1

A vaginal examination is more general than a PAP test. During the vaginal examination, they insert a speculum into your vagina to open it wide enough that they can see inside to check that everything is all right. While the speculum is still in the vagina, the doctor or nurse puts a long q-tip thing inside you and rubs it against the cervix to get a sample of the fluid there. That's where they'll find abnormal cells if there are any. The PAP test doesn't hurt.Then they take the long q-tip out and smear the fluid on a slide and send the slide to the lab where someone looks at the smear under the microscope. That's the PAP test.