Women’s knowledge and practice about different screening methods of breast cancer referring to Shiraz health centers, Iran
Kh.Mahoori,
MD 1 A.S. Hassan Abadi,
MD
2 A. Talei, MD 3
1 Department of Community Medicine, Hormozgan University of Medical Sciences, 2 Department of Community Medicine, 3 Department of Surgery, Shiraz University of Medical Sciences
Introduction: Early detection of breast cancer, the most prevalent cancer in women, plays an important role in the treatment of this otherwise fatal disease. Thus women’s theoretical and practical knowledge of different screening methods can lead to an early detection of this disease.
The present study aims at determining the extent to which women, referring to the health centers in Shiraz, have theoretical and practical knowledge of different screening methods such as breast self examination, clinical examination by physicians and mammography.
Method & Material: One thousand women (35 years or more) who referred to 10 health centers in Shiraz were selected by stratified random sampling and filled out questionnaires containing demographic information and enquiries about the extent to which they were familiar both in theory and practice with the breast cancer screening methods.
Results: The analysis of data revealed that the mean score of the women’s theoretical and practical knowledge of different screening methods of breast cancer were 45% and 28.7% respectively. The women’s theoretical knowledge was negatively correlated with their age (p<0.0001) but positively correlated with education. The women with history of breast diseases and those with a family history of breast cancer showed to have both higher theoretical and practical knowledge as compared with the other women (p<0.0001).
Conclusion: We conclude that it would be necessary to upgrade women’s theoretical and practical knowledge about different screening methods in order to detect breast cancer in its early stages.
Key words: Breast Neoplasms – Knowledge - Attitude