two or three centurions set to escort duty can make short work of both shielded & unshielded fighters with relative ease. they have great PD-coverage, a big OP budget for a frigate, and if you load them up with predominantly ballistic-PD stuff then you'll have a pretty huge surplus of flux for tanking shots from larger ships. the extra OP can go toward stuff like Hardened Shields & Subsystems to keep them on the field for longer, Unstable Injector to allow them to help them close the gap quicker when it comes time to wrap things up/chase ships down in retreats, Frontal Shield for da beeg 360 shield coverage.....its a great ship!!
360 shield coverage--or at least 120 omnishield + accelerated shields--helps a lot to tank shots from fighter swarms, while ships with frontal-shields of 180 degrees or less can be sorta risky.
some interceptors of your own can help as well.