Abstract 2211: Cervical cancer screening and vaccination acceptability and attitudes amongst Arab American women in southeastern Michigan
Authors: Khoja Lilah , Torres Heidi G. , Ayyash Mariam , Tariq Madiha , Mondul Alison M. , Meza Rafael , Pearce Celeste L. 
Published: June 2022

Cervical cancer screening rates among Arab-American women have been consistently shown to be lower than that of non-Hispanic White and Black women in the state of Michigan. Addressing the low cervical cancer screening rates among Arab American women in Michigan requires a deep understanding of the community’s perspective about cervical cancer screening. Thus, we conducted a series of focus groups in Southeastern Michigan to understand the attitudes, acceptability, and barriers of cervical cancer screening among this population.

Four focus groups with a total of 19 women were conducted via Zoom. Participants were recruited through social media channels and community organizations. All focus groups were conducted with self-identifying Arab, Arab American, or Chaldean women aged 30 to 61. The focus groups were conducted in either English, Arabic, or a mixture of both languages. Women completed a brief anchoring survey with demographic questions and a self-assessment of their HPV knowledge (see Table 1). The guided discussion centered around knowledge of cervical cancer, broadly, knowledge of Human papillomavirus (HPV) and its transmission, attitudes towards the HPV vaccination, and attitudes towards cervical cancer screening, which included HPV self-sampling methods. The recorded sessions were transcribed and are being coded using Dedoose Version 8.0.35, a qualitative analysis software. During the focus group, the discussion centered around barriers at the individual and community levels for screening and vaccination, attitudes towards preventive health care including screening, a need for accessible women’s health literature, and health education. The women also discussed vaccine hesitancy related to HPV and COVID19. This suggests the need for targeted community interventions.

General characteristics of participants (N*=19) N Mean Age (N=17) 37.9 8.7 (SD) Married (N=18) 11 61.1% Survey Language Arabic 6 31.6% English 13 68.4% How well would you say the financial needs are met in your household? Just sufficient 9 50% More than sufficiently met 3 16.7% Barely making it 3 16.7% Not met at all 3 16.7% How well informed do you think you are about cervical cancer? Not informed at all 1 5.6% Not well informed 10 55.6% Moderately informed 5 27.8% Well informed 1 5.6% Very well informed 1 5.6% Have you had vaginal sex (intercourse) before? Yes 15 83.3% No 3 16.7% Have you had oral sex before? Yes 8 47.1% No 9 52.9% Do you have any children? Yes 15 83.3% No 3 16.7% *Complete data available for 17 participants, partially complete data for 2 participants, and missing data for 1 participant

Citation Format: Lilah Khoja, Heidi G. Torres, Mariam Ayyash, Madiha Tariq, Alison M. Mondul, Rafael Meza, Celeste L. Pearce. Cervical cancer screening and vaccination acceptability and attitudes amongst Arab American women in southeastern Michigan [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the American Association for Cancer Research Annual Meeting 2022; 2022 Apr 8-13. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2022;82(12_Suppl):Abstract nr 2211.