Evaluation of an outreach intervention to promote cervical cancer screening among Cambodian American women.
BACKGROUND
Southeast Asian women have low levels of Papanicolaou (Pap) testing participation. We conducted a group-randomized controlled trial to evaluate a cervical cancer screening intervention program targeting Seattle's Cambodian refugee community.


METHODS
Women who completed a baseline, community-based survey were eligible for the trial. Neighborhoods were the unit of randomization. Three hundred and seventy survey participants living in 17 neighborhoods were randomized to intervention or control status. Intervention group women received home visits by outreach workers and were invited to group meetings in neighborhood settings. The primary outcome measure was self-reported Pap testing in the year prior to completing a follow-up survey.


RESULTS
The proportion of women in the intervention group reporting recent cervical cancer screening increased from 44% at baseline to 61% at follow-up (+17%). The corresponding proportions among the control group were 51 and 62% (+11%). These temporal increases were statistically significant in both the intervention (P < 0.001) and control (P = 0.027) groups.


CONCLUSIONS
This study was unable to document an increase in Pap testing use specifically in the neighborhood-based outreach intervention group; rather, we found an increase in both intervention and control groups. A general awareness of the project among women and their health care providers as well as other ongoing cervical cancer screening promotional efforts may all have contributed to increases in Pap testing rates.
Taylor
Victoria M
VM
Division of Public Health Sciences, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, Seattle, WA 98105, USA. vtaylor@fhcrc.org
Jackson
J Carey
JC
Yasui
Yutaka
Y
Kuniyuki
Alan
A
Acorda
Elizabeth
E
Marchand
Ann
A
Schwartz
Stephen M
SM
Tu
Shin-Ping
SP
Thompson
Beti
B
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D003159:Community-Institutional Relations; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008875:Middle Aged; D065006:Papanicolaou Test; D002583:Uterine Cervical Neoplasms / Q000175:diagnosis*; D014626:Vaginal Smears