An innovative colorectal cancer screening promotion intervention for low-income, older Latinos

According to 2006 CDC data, only 24.4% of Latinos over age 50 had received a FOBT within the past two years and 46.6% had ever had a sigmoidoscopy; the screening rates for low-income Latinos were even lower. These screening rates are significantly below the Healthy People 2010 benchmark for colorectal cancer screening and place Latinos at high risk for diagnoses at an advanced stage of the disease and thus lower chances of survival. Regular colorectal cancer screening remains the pivotal obstacle to improved Latino colorectal cancer survival. The need for interventions to improve screening and early detection is an urgent public health problem, yet the challenge is to effectively overcome cultural, linguistic and attitudinal barriers with an intervention that promotes adoption of recommended screening and risk reduction behaviors by low-income Latinos.

This presentation describes an education intervention designed to deliver culturally and linguistically appropriate colorectal cancer information to low-income, low literacy Latinos. The intervention uses interactive, multimedia touchscreen kiosks to effectively overcome attention, linguistic and cultural barriers in delivering cancer education messages. The education intervention presents screening and prevention strategies, corrects misconceptions about colorectal cancer risk factors, improves attitudes toward screening, and models recommended screening and risk reduction behaviors. The design of the intervention was guided by formative research that identified barriers to screening among non-adherent, low-income Latinos as well as pathways to screening among low-income Latinos adherent to the 2005 USPSTF recommendations for colorectal cancer screening.