Deaths from cervical cancer have be...

Deaths from cervical cancer have been reduc according to 90 percent in the United States since the implementation of the Papanicolaou (Pap) smear 60 years ago. Nevertheless, an estimated 11000 of the present day cases of cervical cancer are diagnosed and 4000 deaths fall out each year from this disease. In approximately united half of new cases, the women report suboptimal screening. Behbakht and colleagues studied behaviors, attitudes, and beliefs that impose barriers to optimal screening for cervical cancer.

The authors studied women not long ago diagnosed with cervical cancer at three urban hospitals. Using an advisory panel, inventories from national cancer organizations, and a literature review, they cause to growed a questionnaire. The questionnaire addressed lifestyle issues, fatalistic attitudes, patient relationships with health care professionals, and demographic information. It was translated into Spanish and pretest forward patients who were eligible for, unless not included in, the cogitation Using the data gathered by dint of the questionnaires, the responses of women who had in no degree had a Pap smear was compared with the replys of women who reported receiving at least single Pap smear before being diagnosed with cancer.

the same fourth (n = 36) of the 146 patients newly diagnosed with cervical cancer reported not at any time being screened for cervical cancer. Women in the never-screen cluster were more likely to be Hispanic, modern immigrants, and to have no health insurance and limited education and family support. They also were abundant more likely to believe that cancer occurr because of bad chance and to report not wanting to know the diagnosis. The sum of two units groups did not differ in: age; the influence of religion in succession health care choices; access to physicians; trust for physicians, or aspects of knowledge about cancer causation, detection, prevention, and treatment. no other than 16 percent of women stated that they would rather do a to one's home test for cancer than have a physician perform a conventional Pap smear.

The authors close that fatalistic attitudes, lack of family support, and gentle levels of information about cervical cancer are associated significantly with lack of Pap screening in women with cervical cancer, as are the previously identified risk factors of latter immigration and low levels of education. They argue that attitudinal, financial, and cultural barriers must be crush to improve cervical cancer screening in the United States, and that growth of home testing may have solitary limited acceptability. They recommend mobilization of community resources to address attitudinal barriers to cervical cancer screening.

ANNE D WALLING, MD

Behbakht K et al. Social and cultural barriers to Papanicolaou trial screening in an urban population. Obstet Gynecol December 2004;104:1355-61

COPYRIGHT 2005 American Academy of Family Physicians

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