Psychosocial Support Services for Latinas with Breast Cancer
Creators: name: University Of California Office Of The President
Publisher: name: University of California Office of the President
publisherIdentifier: https://ror.org/00dmfq477
publisherIdentifierScheme: ROR
Year: 2024

description: Introduction: Women with breast cancer, a life-threatening illness, often experience emotional distress including depression, anxiety, and relationship problems. Psychosocial support services can greatly improve the quality of life of some of these women, and it is now recommended that psychosocial services be offered as a part of routine cancer care. Latina breast cancer patients infrequently utilize these services, although they may be more likely than White women to experience distress due to breast cancer. This underutilization by Latinas is poorly understood, but possible explanations include lack of awareness, physician recommendation, and culturally and linguistically adequate programs. Several Latino community organizations have joined to increase access to and capacity for these services.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 Research Questions: This research project aims to answer several questions. First, what individual, social and cultural factors increase or decrease access to support services among Spanish-speaking Latinas with breast cancer? Second, what components of these support programs are most useful from the perspective of Spanish-speaking Latinas who have used support services? Finally, what type of training do peer support counselors need to enable them to provide adequate support to Latinas with breast cancer? Based on this information, a culturally appropriate outreach and support intervention will be developed with several community organizations to train Spanish-speaking breast cancer survivors as peer support counselors (PSCs). Thus, the community identified goals of increasing access to and capacity for psychosocial services will be achieved.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 Methods: We will conduct group interviews separately with Latina women who have and have not used formal support services and ask them about factors that may or may not have influenced their awareness of services and decision to use them. We will also individually interview current and former Spanish-speaking breast cancer clients of the Círculo de Vida support program to ask them to identify the aspects of the program that were helpful, those that were not, and their recommendations for improvement. Finally, we will conduct interviews with current peer support counselors (with a number of Northern California organizations) who provide services to Spanish-speaking Latinas with breast cancer to develop a formal PSC training program. An advisory board composed of professionals and Spanish-speaking survivors will guide us as we finalize and train a new core of PSCs and disseminate the training program.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 Innovative Elements: While studies have looked at the benefits of support services among women diagnosed with breast cancer, research has overlooked the topics of access to and outcomes of services among Latina women. Two community organizations, one with extensive experience and the other new to providing support services for women with breast cancer, will work with a Latina researcher from UCSF to identify optimum outreach and support strategies and develop a training program to prepare Latina breast cancer survivors as PSCs. This study is unique in that it will bring together women with breast cancer, peer support counselors, community advocates, researchers, and clinicians to increase access to support services and create community capacity to meet the increased demand for culturally and linguistically appropriate psychosocial support services.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 Community Involvement: Círculo de Vida (Circle of Life) is a successful community based organization that provides outreach and peer support to Latina women diagnosed with cancer. Una Mano Amiga (A Helping Hand), a multi-agency coalition, has requested training on the model used by Círculo de Vida so that it can establish psychosocial support programs for women in the community it serves. The researcher will work closely with Círculo de Vida to identify program components that are effective in reaching Latinas and improving their psychosocial adjustment to breast cancer. The study will create a forum in which community leaders, local breast cancer advocates, and peer counselors can come together and develop a model that will increase the capacity of community organizations to provide psychosocial support and referral services to Spanish-speaking Latinas with breast cancer.