Effect of a media-led education campaign on breast and cervical cancer screening among Vietnamese-American women.
BACKGROUND
Previous research has shown that breast and cervical cancer screening rates are low among Vietnamese women.


METHODS
Over a 24-month period, we implemented a media-led community education campaign to promote recognition, intention, receipt, and currency of routine checkups, clinical breast examinations, mammograms, and Pap tests among Vietnamese-American women in Alameda and Santa Clara Counties in northern California. Women in Los Angeles and Orange Counties in southern California served as controls. To evaluate its impact, pretest telephone interviews were conducted of 451 randomly selected women in the intervention area and 482 women in the control area and posttest interviews with 454 and 422 women, respectively.


RESULTS
At posttest, after controlling for demographic differences in the surveyed populations, the odds ratios for the intervention effect were statistically significant for having heard of a general checkup, Paptest, and clinical breast examination (CBE); planning to have a checkup, Pap test, CBE, and mammogram; and having had a checkup and Pap test. The intervention had no effect on being up to date for any of the tests.


CONCLUSIONS
A media-led education intervention succeeded in increasing recognition of and intention to undertake screening tests more than receipt of or currency with the tests.
Jenkins
C N
CN
Division of General Internal Medicine, Department of Medicine, University of California at San Francisco, San Francisco, California, 94102, USA.
McPhee
S J
SJ
Bird
J A
JA
Pham
G Q
GQ
Nguyen
B H
BH
Nguyen
T
T
Lai
K Q
KQ
Wong
C
C
Davis
T B
TB
D000328:Adult; D001213:Asian / Q000523:psychology / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D001943:Breast Neoplasms / Q000517:prevention & control* / Q000523:psychology; D002140:California; D005260:Female; D019538:Health Care Surveys; D006266:Health Education / Q000458:organization & administration*; D007722:Health Knowledge, Attitudes, Practice; D006801:Humans; D008137:Longitudinal Studies; D015141:Los Angeles; D008402:Mass Media / Q000592:standards*; D008403:Mass Screening / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D008875:Middle Aged; D010342:Patient Acceptance of Health Care / Q000208:ethnology; D018401:Sample Size; D012494:Sampling Studies; D012959:Socioeconomic Factors; D013223:Statistics as Topic; D002583:Uterine Cervical Neoplasms / Q000517:prevention & control* / Q000523:psychology; D014744:Vietnam / Q000208:ethnology; D016387:Women's Health