Knowledge, attitudes and behavior about breast cancer in women presenting to Early Cancer Diagnosis, Screening and Education Centre in Kahramanmaras, Turkey

This study was performed to investigate knowledge, attitudes and behavior about breast cancer in the women applying to Early Cancer Diagnosis, Screening and Education Centre. The study included 96 women applying to Early Cancer Diagnosis, Screening and Education Centre between 1 January 2013 and 1 February 2014. The women were offered information about the study and those giving written informed consent were enrolled in the study. A questionnaire created by the researchers was used to collect data. The mean age of participants was 40.28 +/- 9.21 years (min=18, max=62). Seventy-eight participants (81.3%) reported that the most frequent cancer was breast cancer and 16 participants (16.7%) reported that uterine cancer was the most frequent cancer. Breast cancer was reported to appear in all stages of life by 73 participants (76%), in old age by 13 participants (13.5%) and in young people by 10 participants (10.4%). Information about breast cancer was found to be offered to 37 women (38.5%) by health staff and 24 women (25%) by radio/TV programs. Fifty-four women (56.3%) performed breast self-examination, but 42 women (43.8%) did not perform the examination. Thirty-four women aged 40 years and older (61.8%) and 20 women aged younger than 40 years (48.8%) were found to carry out breast self-examination, though there was not a significant difference between them (P=0.203). The study showed that the women did not have sufficient knowledge about breast cancer. In addition, the women did not implement methods used for early diagnosis of breast cancer.