Predisposing and Enabling Factors Associated with Mammography Use Among Hispanic and Non-Hispanic White Women Living in a Rural Area

Context: Women who do not receive regular mammograms are more likely than others to have breast cancer diagnosed at an advanced stage. Purpose: To examine predisposing and enabling factors associated with mammography use among Hispanic and non-Hispanic White women. Methods: Baseline data were used from a larger study on cancer prevention in rural Washington state. In a sample of 20 communities, 537 women formed the sample for this study. The main outcomes were ever having had a mammogram and having had a mammogram within the past 2 years. Findings: Reporting ever having had a mammogram was inversely associated with lack of health insurance (OR = 0.37, 95% CI: 0.16-0.84), ages under 50 years (OR = 0.23, 95% CI: 0.12-0.45), high cost of exams (OR = 0.48, 95% CI: 0.27-0.87), and lack of mammography knowledge (OR = 0.16, 95% CI: 0.07-0.37), while increasing education levels were positively associated (OR = 1.72, 95% CI: 1.09-2.70). Reporting mammography use within the past 2 years was inversely associated with ages under 50 years (OR = 0.49, 95% CI: 0.27-0.88) and over 70 years (OR = 0.47, 95% CI: 0.24-0.94), lack of health insurance (OR = 0.23, 95% CI: 0.10-0.50), and high cost of exams (OR = 0.55, 95% CI: 0.35-0.87). Conclusions: Continued resources and programs for cancer screening are needed to improve mammography participation among women without health insurance or low levels of education.