A Myrtle Beach obstetrician is testing a new vaccine that could save thousands of lives.

For the past six months, Dr. Helena Kirkpatrick of Magnolia OB/GYN has been doing clinical trials on a cutting edge vaccine designed to halt the progression of a condition that often leads to cervical cancer.

Today, that condition, called cervical dysplasia, is treated with surgery that can lead to problems with future pregnancies in the patient.

The new vaccine is intended to treat the disease while avoiding the side effects.

"What they're trying to do is stimulate the woman's immune system to fight the cancer, the pre-cancerous lesion, and resolve that process without having to have surgery," said Dr. Kirkpatrick.

Most cervical cancer is caused by the Human Papillomavirus or HPV, which appears in 80 percent of sexually active women, though most do not have complications from it.

There is today a preventative vaccine that girls often receive before they become sexually active. But the new vaccine now being tested could be a life-saver for those who have the pre-cancerous condition and did not get inoculated when they were young.

"A large population of women like myself never had the chance of getting the vaccination, so there's still a great need for this treatment," Dr. Kirkpatrick said.

Patients testing the new vaccine receive a series of shots that go deep into the muscle and can be painful, but if it works, Dr. Kirkpatrick said the vaccine will be well worth the effort for the thousands of women who contract cervical cancer.

"Even now with the development of pap smears and the annual screening and everything like that, people are still dying of cervical cancer."

Dr. Kirkpatrick said it will take another six months to find out if the new vaccine works. She is one of several doctors around the country testing the vaccine.

About 12,000 women develop cervical cancer in the U.S. each year. Around 4,000 of them die from it.