Are self-reported dates of mammograms accurate?
BACKGROUND
This paper assesses the accuracy of self-reported dates of last mammograms from a postal survey compared to dates of mammograms in medical records.


METHODS
The subjects included women 50 years of age and older who were members of a local health maintenance organization, had reported ever having a mammogram, and had completed a postal questionnaire about breast cancer screening. The date of last mammogram from the postal surveys was compared to the date in medical records.


RESULTS
Of 78 women who self-reported both the month and year of last mammogram in a postal survey, agreement within 1 month with the medical record data was 62.8% and agreement within 3 months was 75.6%. A total of 32.1% of the subjects underestimated the time since their last mammogram, while only 5.1% overestimated. Based on self-reported dates, 85.9% of the subjects had a mammogram within the last year compared to 76.9% based on medical records. Using medical records as the "gold standard", the sensitivity of self-reported mammogram within the last year versus more than 1 year ago was 98% and the specificity was 56%.
Fulton-Kehoe
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Department of Preventive Medicine, School of Medicine, State University of New York at Stony Brook 11794-8036.
Burg
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Lane
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D000368:Aged; D005260:Female; D006279:Health Maintenance Organizations; D006801:Humans; D008327:Mammography / Q000523:psychology / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D008499:Medical Records / Q000592:standards*; D008568:Memory; D008875:Middle Aged; D010349:Patient Compliance; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D012680:Sensitivity and Specificity; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires / Q000592:standards*; D013997:Time Factors