Breast Cancer Screening There is a need to increase

There is a need to increase the breast cancer screening among low-income and minority groups of women, and to improve the followup of these screening procedures with appropriate treatment.

Studies have demonstrated that low-income and minority women who have been screened and found to have suspicious or abnormal mammograms are most likely not to follow through with diagnostic tests appointments, effectively delaying the diagnosis and treatment of an early stage breast tumor (The Screening, 2003). This is an important finding because at a later stage of diagnosis, morbidity and mortality are higher among low-income, minority women. Non-adherence and less than desired rates of followup after an abnormal screening run as high as 60 percent among these medically underserved women.

Barriers to followup include the health care system, health care providers, and personal and cultural barriers (The Screening, 2003). These women are likely to be uninsured or underinsured, without a regular source of medical care, and they receive only receive fragmented screening, diagnostic and treatment services, if any. The types of health care systems these women consult do not have adequate tracking or followup mechanisms and this leads to a break down in provider-patient communications, and language and cultural barriers often mean these women never receive adequate advice and counseling about the results of their mammograms.

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ing sites had to wait more than a month for screening. Long waiting periods causes many women to avoid testing altogether. Currently, as many as 21 percent of radiology centers in Florida do not accept Medicaid for mammograms, and only four percent of women with Medicaid receive mammograms. Low-income African American and Hispanic women underuse mammography screening even though its use can reduce breast cancer mortality rates (Fernandez, Palmer and Leong-Wu, 2005). Predisposing factors to this underutilization of screening mammograms include fear of mastectomy, and lack of knowledge about breast cancer. Both these groups have lower breast cancer survival rates than Whites and non-Hispanics because they tend to be diagnosed at later stages of the disease. Repeat screening rates for the general population in the United States is 46 percent, but for these two groups is five percent for African American and 10 percent for Hispanic women. Women who are White, have a higher level of education, were born in the United States, have higher incomes, have regular visits with physicians, have a family history and vulnerability to breast cancer, and receive physician recommendations are more likely to have repeat mammography sc

Category: Medical - B