The demographic and Psychological determinants of performing Mammography among the Employed Women in Medical Professions in western Iran: the Role of Threat Appraisal and Coping Appraisal

Breast cancer is the most prevalent cause of cancer-related mortality among women. Mammography and early detection of breast cancer a play the important role in the treatment process. The current study aimed to determine the demographic and psychological determinants of performing Mammography screening among employed women in western Iran.
In this cross-sectional study, 164 employed women of age 40 years and over in Hamadan medical professions, were included in the study in 2018 using a stratified random sampling. The data were collected using a researcher-made questionnaire consisting demographic characteristics and protection motivation theory constructs. The data were analyzed using descriptive analysis and logistic and linear regression.
The mean age of the study population was 46.68 ± 4.39 years. 6.1% of the people performed mammography on a regular basis.The regression analysis indicated that threat appraisal had more important role in mammography compared to coping appraisal.Moreover, protection motivation was the most important predictor constructs of mammography behavior (R2 = 0.17).There was also a significant relationship between mammography and demographic variables such as pre-existing health condition (P = 0.001), family history of breast cancer (P = 0.005) and menopausal status (P = 0.001).
Protection motivation theory is an effective framework for educational interventions to prevent breast cancer. Furthermore, considering the threat appraisal and intention are the most important effective structures of the motivation protection theory on mammography, and therefore, codifying the training programs with the purpose of increasing perceived threat appraisal and intention is suggested.