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Cancer Control Research

Abstract

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Breast cancer is the most frequently diagnosed cancer among Korean-American (KA) women, and they present with larger tumor size and more advanced-stage cancer than Caucasian women, implying that KA women adhere less to breast cancer screening guidelines. As the nation's racially and culturally diverse ethnic subgroups are expected to be the majority of the total U.S. population (51.1%) by the early part of the next century, the U.S. government has made health promotion and disease prevention for minorities a national priority. The specific goal related to breast cancer in Healthy People 2010 (HP2010) is that 70% of all women 40 years or older should have had a mammogram within the preceding 2 tears. Particularly low rates of mammography use among minority subpopulations such as KA women are disconcerting: 50% of KA women never had a mammogram compared to 21% of Caucasians. The specific aim of this proposed pre- and post-test experimental, two-group design study is to evaluate the effectiveness of the culturally competent educational intervention GO EARLY, specifically designed to increase mammography use among KA immigrant women 40 years or older. The GO EARLY intervention will be a 45-minute, semi-structured, stage-based, interactive session on breast cancer screening knowledge and beliefs for KA women grouped according to stages of mammography use (i.e. precontemplators, contemplators, and precontemplation or contemplation relapsers) delivered in the KA church conference room. Total 214 KA women from 2 KA churches in suburban Chicago (one church as intervention and the other church as control group) will be participated. Participants will be surveyed in person, pre- and post-intervention on breast cancer and screening-related knowledge, beliefs, and stages of mammography use by trained research assistants and community facilitators. Women in the intervention group will answer a pre-intervention survey (Time 1), attend GO EARLY session, and complete post-intervention survey at 8 weeks (Time 2) and 24 weeks (Time 3). The control group women will complete Time 1 and Times 2 and 3 at the same intervals as the intervention group but will not receive GO EARLY. Given that past research studies established the effectiveness of stage-based intervention on mammography use among Caucasians and African Americans, it is imperative that we extend such strategies to other groups of women most in need of mammography interventions.