Date of Conferral

1-1-2010

Degree

Doctor of Public Health (DrPH)

School

Public Health

Advisor

Patrick Bassey Williams

Abstract

Breast cancer is one of the most widespread chronic diseases and a major cause of death among women in the United States. African American women have a higher incidence of breast cancer than their counterparts from other ethnic/racial groups. The purpose of this cross-sectional survey of 126 African American females from the western US metropolitan area was to assess knowledge, attitudes, and behavior with respect to breast cancer manifestation, detection services, and the role of mammography in breast cancer prevention and control. The health belief model guided this study. A 41-item, ethnically sensitive, self-administered, and gender-specific instrument, the Champion Revised Susceptibility, Benefits, and Barriers Scale for Mammography Screening, was used in this study. Analysis of variance, the Scheffe post hoc tests, and Fisher's exact test were used to analyze the data. The results showed that all but three participants (97.6%) reported having had breast cancer screening; almost all of the participants were compliant and answered the knowledge question. The findings also showed that the women with high levels of education reported lower benefits of mammography scores and lower barriers to mammography scores; and higher cues to action scores. Income was not significantly related to attitude toward breast cancer screening. The implication for positive social change is that these results may help to facilitate continued development of intervention strategies to encourage African American women to utilize early breast cancer detection services.

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