Document Type : Original Article

Authors

1 Department of Reproductive Health, School of Nursing and Midwifery, Kermanshah University of Medical Sciences, Kermanshah, Iran

2 Assistant Professor, Department of Entrepreneurship and Rural Development, Ilam University, Ilam, Iran

Abstract

INTRODUCTION: It is universally acknowledged that strengthen the participation rate in breast
cancer (BC) screening can find cancer in its earlier stages. The aim of this study was to determine the
effect of regular visits to the health centers on women’s knowledge and attitude about BC screening.
MATERIALS AND METHODS: In a cross‑sectional study, data were collected from 380 women
identified with Kurdish background, who were registered in health care centers of Islamabad‑e Gharb
during January and February 2017. The subjects were divided into two regular and irregular groups
based on the quantity of presence in health centers. Data on women’s awareness and attitude about
BC screening were collected by a trained interviewer using a structured questionnaire. Bivariate
analysis, analysis of variance, and independent sample t‑test were used to see the mean differences
within the groups. The level of confidence was set at 0.05 significant.
RESULTS: Women were representative of four health‑care centers of the city, mainly ≤39 years
old  (73.9%), married  (96.3%), with high school education  (44.2%) characteristics. The total
mean  ±  standard deviation of awareness score about BC was 6.03  ±  3.90. In total, 19.2% of
participants had poor  (<2.13), 64.2% had an average  (2.13–9.93), and 16.6% had good  (˃9.93)
awareness about BC. The results showed that the level of knowledge and attitude about BC screening
was significantly different between regular and irregular groups (P < 0.05).
CONCLUSION: An important message from this study is the need for improved and coordinated
BC education for all social classes of women. It is necessary to discover ways to encourage women
with academic education to visit health centers regularly during interventional studies.

Keywords

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