Abstract B022: Increasing breast cancer knowledge in Puerto Rico through partnerships
Authors: Salgado Omayra , Medina Lizbeth , Rivera Mirza , Ortiz Livia , De La Torre Taina , Guzman Diana , Tortolero Guillermo 
Published: September 2020

Introduction: In 2015, according to the Puerto Rico Central Cancer registry (PRCCR), 2,188 women were diagnosed with invasive breast cancer and 432 women died from this disease. The BRFSS by 2016, reported there still are 20% (1 in 5) of women in Puerto Rico aged ≥40 year who are not in compliance with current breast cancer screening guidelines. For that reason, is necessary to continue effective education efforts to increase breast cancer screening in the women population. For this purpose, the Puerto Rico Breast and Cervical Cancer Early Detection Program (PRBCCEDP) in collaboration with Cooperative Extension Services (CES) developed a pilot project to evaluate a breast cancer flipchart to know if this tool could help to increase the knowledge on breast cancer. Method: The PRBCCEDP established collaboration with the Cooperative Extension Services (CES) to develop and implement a group educational intervention using a Breast Cancer Flipchart to address breast cancer burden, risk factors, and other information. This pilot project included the participation of 10 Family and Consumer Educators (FCE’s) in the north area of Puerto Rico. A total of 148 women participated in 11 educational activities and 114 completed a pre- and post-test and an evaluation of the activity. Descriptive and quantitative data analysis were made using SPSS (version 23). Results: The pilot project results are the following: the participants were mostly women (96.3%) with an average age of 53 years and 43% had completed high-school. Forty-two percent of participants were covered by the Government Health Plan, and only 68% have had a mammogram in the last two years. The majority of the participants (90%) rated as good the time assigned to the activity, the content of the educational activity, and the language level used on the flipchart. Moreover, 85% of the participants rated as good the visuals used and the flipchart. In addition., the 90% of the participants totally agreed that the activity: Increased their knowledge of breast cancer, risk factors and recommended screening guidelines, motivated them to visit the doctor to talk about mammography and breast cancer, and to talk with their family and friends about of breast cancer. There was a significant increase in knowledge (p &lt;0.05) in the post test in five of the six questions compared to the pre-test. Conclusion: This project demonstrates the effectiveness of a group educational intervention, utilizing a flipchart, to increase breast cancer knowledge among the Puerto Rican women. This tool could be helpful for FCE’s conducting educational activities in settings without technological resources. These efforts helped to include the breast cancer flipchart educational activity in an educational module entitled Promoting Healthy Lifestyles. In 2019, CES successfully implemented this educational intervention in the northern and southern regions of the island with the participation of 30 FCE’s.

Citation Format: Omayra Salgado, Lizbeth Medina, Mirza Rivera, Livia Ortiz, Taina De La Torre, Diana Guzman, Guillermo Tortolero. Increasing breast cancer knowledge in Puerto Rico through partnerships [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the Twelfth AACR Conference on the Science of Cancer Health Disparities in Racial/Ethnic Minorities and the Medically Underserved; 2019 Sep 20-23; San Francisco, CA. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Epidemiol Biomarkers Prev 2020;29(6 Suppl_2):Abstract nr B022.