![](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/1767627013_869_grey-placeholder.png\")
![\"BBC](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/aa3b52e0-eaff-11f0-8e8e-7f477e15473f.jpg.webp.webp\")
BBC<\/p>\nIsobel Fry,North Westand<\/p>\n
Lauren Hirst,North West<\/p>\n
BBC<\/p>\n
Emily Salter has called for more accessible and inclusive healthcare services for disabled women<\/p>\n
A woman who uses a wheelchair said she had “given up” trying to have a cervical screening after turning up for an appointment to find she could not get inside a treatment room. <\/p>\n
Emily Salter, who is unable to walk after falling from a 9m (30ft) cliff seven years ago, said she had tried to arrange for the screening, known as a smear test, four times but appointments had been cancelled due to accessibility issues.<\/p>\n
The 33-year-old, from Preston, Lancashire, said: “I thought the NHS would be a safe place for me to go without having to worry or panic beforehand.”<\/p>\n
An NHS England spokesperson said screening services are “expected to make reasonable adjustments” to support women with disabilities.<\/p>\n
This includes “ensuring suitable facilities and access to specialist equipment where needed”, the NHS spokesperson added. <\/p>\n
A survey by the Spinal Injuries Association found two-thirds of women with physical disabilities had not been able to attend a smear test appointment.<\/p>\n
Just under half of those cited accessibility issues as the top reason for this.<\/p>\n
“When I’m on the phone I always say I’m in a wheelchair, I can’t stand up, just to make them aware” said Salter. <\/p>\n
“You turn up and the building has steps to go inside. The next one, the room was that small that the wheelchair wouldn’t fit next to the bed.<\/p>\n
“And then the fourth one, they actually rang me to cancel because they said it wasn’t accessible.”<\/p>\n
‘Entirely preventable’<\/p>\n
Dharshana Sridhar, campaigns manager at the Spinal Injuries Association, said: “The system is not made for women’s health to start with and then it’s even worse for women with disabilities.<\/p>\n
“And then some of the barriers are actually entirely preventable, like inadequate equipment, like a lack of height adjustable examination beds, but none of this has been happening for decades.”<\/p>\n
Local screening teams can “offer practical support such as longer appointments at accessible sites and alternative clinic options” to help women with physical disabilities, the NHS spokesperson said. <\/p>\n
But Salter said she had “given up”, adding: “I don’t know what more I can do to access these services.”<\/p>\n
“I just think it’s very sad that we’re put in a position where we feel bad about ourselves because we can’t access the healthcare,” she said.<\/p>\n
“I’m grateful for what the NHS has done for me. They’ve showed me I can live again.<\/p>\n
“Life doesn’t end when you have a spinal cord injury but I want my life to continue and if I can’t have these checks for cancer then they’re not going to be able to catch it quick enough.”<\/p>\n
![\"Sally](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/a03bdb10-eb00-11f0-8e8e-7f477e15473f.jpg.webp.webp\")
<\/p>\n
Sally Jones said those with disabilities have to “keep on nagging to be heard”<\/p>\n
Sally Jones, from Ellesmere Port, Cheshire, was left paralysed from the waist down after a motorbike crash in January 2020.<\/p>\n
The 45-year-old has a history of abnormal cells in the family so she said she had been left feeling worried that she had not been able to have the test.<\/p>\n
“I try to put it at the back of my mind,” she said.<\/p>\n
“I think given the family history as well, I’m probably one of the people that should be going for regular tests.<\/p>\n
Sally said she had also been left humiliated after she was given no option but to have her coronavirus vaccination outside due to a lack of access at the site. <\/p>\n
“It’s a battle,” she said. <\/p>\n
You’ve got to be proactive and you’ve got to row your own boat and you’ve got to keep on nagging to be heard.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Isobel Fry,North Westand Lauren Hirst,North West BBC Emily Salter has called for more accessible and inclusive healthcare services…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":397824,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[43,44,41,39,42,40],"class_list":{"0":"post-397823","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-headlines","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-top-news","11":"tag-top-stories","12":"tag-topnews","13":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/397823","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=397823"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/397823\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/397824"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=397823"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=397823"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=397823"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}