Perception of access to screening facilities and breast cancer screening behaviors among low-income women in New Jersey

Introduction:

Racial/ethnic and socioeconomic disparities in breast cancer outcomes have been well documented.  Access to mammograms may account for some this variation in racial and socioeconomic differences in cancer outcomes.  Few studies, however, have explored if perception of access to screenings are associated with use mammography services for low-income and diverse racial/ethnic populations.

Methods:

We sought to evaluate and characterize the relationship between the perception/knowledge of access to free or low-cost screening facilities and breast cancer screening behaviors using multivariate logistic regression of data from a cross-sectional study of low-income women in New Jersey.

Results:

A preliminary analysis of the data (N=198) indicate that African American women were less likely to have had a mammogram in the past two years compared to white women (OR = 0.25, 95% CI = 0.06-1.01), though the effect failed to achieve statistical significance. Likelihood of adhering to breast cancer screening guidelines was significantly positively associated with increasing age (OR= 1.18, 95% CI = 1.10 – 1.25), having insurance in the past 2 years (OR = 11.55, 95% CI = 1.04-128.79), and awareness of a free/low cost mammography center (OR= 7.95, 95% CI= 2.11 – 30.06), and was inversely associated with higher income (OR= 0.24, 95% CI = 0.08 – 0.73).  

Discussion:

The findings of this study provide evidence that among a population of low income women, simply knowing the location of free and low cost screening centers may increase the likelihood of utilizing screening, which can be important in terms of developing targeted prevention interventions to decrease disparities in breast cancer outcomes.