Back to Annual Meeting Page		American Public Health Association 133rd Annual Meeting & Exposition December 10-14, 2005 Philadelphia, PA

Abstract #108234

Nadereh Pourat, PhD, Center for Health Policy Research, University of California, Los Angeles, 10911 Weyburn Ave, Suite 300, Los Angeles, CA 90024, 310-794-2201, pourat@ucla.edu, Marjorie Kagawa-Singer, RN, MN, PhD, School of Public Health, University of California, Los Angeles, Box 951772, Los Angeles, CA 90095, and Alek Sripipatana, MPH, UCLA, Center for Health Policy Research, 10911 Weyburn Avenue, Suite 300, Los Angeles, CA 90024-2887.

Asian American women are the only ethnic population with breast cancer as the primary cause of death; however, they have the lowest rates of screening for clinical breast exam and mammograms of all ethnic groups. Unfamiliarity with the US health system can be partially responsible for these discrepancies due to high rates of immigration among Asian Americans.

Using the California Health Interview Survey (CHIS) we propose to create a reliable measure of Health Acculturation and Navigation Skills (HANS) to determine more accurate, proximal and modifiable promoters of breast, colo-rectal, and cervical cancer screening. We used factor analysis to parcel out health acculturation and navigation skills from general acculturation measures.

Preliminary analyses reveal that adult Asian American women differ from white women in a number of characteristics. Asian American women are more often uninsured, less often have a usual source of care, and more often report not having any doctor visits in the past year than whites. Asian Americans more often report limited English fluency, having lived in the US for less than 10 years, being younger, being married, and being low income than whites. Preliminary factor analysis suggest that traditional measures of acculturation such as length of residence in the US, English fluency, and country of birth do not correlate with predictors of health system utilization such as insurance coverage, usual source of care, and doctor's recommendation of various cancer screenings.

Learning Objectives: "At the conclusion of the session, the participants in this session will be able to

2. Distinguish how HANS differs from general acculturation.”
4. Identify the differences between the characteristics of Asian American and white women in accessing preventive health care.”

Keywords: Cancer Screening, Asian Women

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

I wish to disclose that I have NO financial interests or other relationship with the manufactures of commercial products, suppliers of commercial services or commercial supporters.