Organised screening has played a major role in preventing cervical cancer among women in Scotland and reducing the number dying from the disease. A decade ago the system for summoning women for their three-yearly smear tests was so fragmented and inconsistent that many patients were slipping through the net.

Organised screening has played a major role in preventing cervical cancer among women in Scotland and reducing the number dying from the disease. A decade ago the system for summoning women for their three-yearly smear tests was so fragmented and inconsistent that many patients were slipping through the net.

Cytology was perceived as a Cinderella of the NHS.

Much has changed for the better. Health education, greater awareness and better-run GP practices, with more emphasis on prevention, mean more women are being tested, though testing rates have dipped slightly recently. A £2.75m investment in a new method for taking and testing cervical samples - liquid-based cytology - has reduced the number of inconclusive test results. The next step in this revolution is the introduction of a £5m centralised, streamlined and computerised model called the Scottish Cervical Call/Recall System (SCCRS), scheduled for May 28. It has a number of obvious benefits: for instance, bar codes will do away with the need for form-filling and staff will be able to track the progress of samples sent for testing.

However, family doctors in the Glasgow area are so concerned about the system's potential pitfalls that they are tabling a motion to the BMA conference next Thursday calling on National Services Scotland (NSS) to postpone the introduction of SCCRS and consider a number of alterations to its operation. With 1000 staff in the Greater Glasgow and Clyde area alone, each requiring a two-hour familiarisation course, there are real concerns that training will not be completed on time, which could result in smear tests being postponed.

There are also misgivings about ending the practice of informing GPs by letter of abnormal results. Instead, doctors will be required to access all results online. And, though the NSS suggested otherwise yesterday, doctors interviewed by The Herald are adamant that when their computers crash, they will be forced to suspend tests because they have been told there is no paper-based back-up. Such issues are less trivial than they appear. Women who do not present themselves for screening are often targeted for on-the-spot testing when they visit the surgery on other business. If the computers are down, this will be a lost opportunity.

Though a parallel system, in which computer records are duplicated by paper ones, is both wasteful and inefficient, the way in which SCCRS is being introduced rings alarm bells. The governments at both Holyrood and Westminster have an unparalleled record of being dazzled by smart salesmanship and the theoretical potential of IT solutions that go way over budget and fail to deliver: the Passport Office, the air traffic control system, the Child Support Agency, tax credits, the Criminal History System, the Scottish Executive accounting system . . . the list goes on.

It would be churlish for NSS to ignore doctors' misgivings, so soon after the fiasco of the new computerised system for interviewing junior doctors. Only this week doctors received an abject apology from Health Secretary Patricia Hewitt for failing a acknowledge their misgivings.

Cervical cancer remains a big killer. Around half of the 250 or so women diagnosed in Scotland each year will be dead within five years. The new regime needs to be fine-tuned until doctors and patients can be confident that it represents a step forward, not back.