Cervical Cancer

Cervical cancer is the third most common cancer in women and while more than 85% of the cases occur in the developing world the burden of disease is also apparent in low-income, minority and low literacy populations of the United States. In the United States, the annual incidence of cervical cancer is approximately 12,000 and over half of these cases occur in women who have never had a Pap smear, and an additional 20-30% of cases occur in women who have not had a Pap smear in the proceeding five years. Although the Pap smear is the most widely used and accepted screening tool, it requires strict follow up to be effective. Patient communication, understanding, and health literacy are some of several structural barriers that are key elements of adherence to this screening test. While studies show that educational interventions promote utilization of pap smears and adherence to testing, there is a paucity of published data regarding the efficacy of available educational material. Our aim was to evaluate the ACOG education pamphlet Understanding Abnormal Pap Tests Results to determine if it was health literate for women receiving care at a university-based Medicaid Gynecology clinic in Manhattan, where the patient population is pre-dominately Hispanic and African American . Assessing Patient Understanding of the ACOG Abnormal Pap Smear Pamphlet: A Randomized Controlled Trial David-West Gizelka et al.

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Last date updated on April, 2024