Elderly women constitute most of the new cases and deaths from breast cancer.
Elderly minority women bear the largest brunt of these two diseases. Yet, a new study shows that elderly black and Hispanic women are screened less for breast and cervical cancer than their younger counterparts. The researchers surveyed by telephone a sample of 1,420 Hispanic and black women from New York City. The Hispanic women were from Colombia, the Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico, and Ecuador, and the black women were from the United States, the Caribbean, and Haiti. Women 65 years of age and older were 21 percent less likely than younger women to have ever had a Pap smear and 33 percent less apt to have had a Pap smear recently, after controlling for access to care, sociodemographic factors, health, time in the United States, and attitudes towards health care.