Knowledge about breast self-examination among women older than 18 years in Ahvaz

Breast cancer is the second leading cause of cancer deaths and the most common cancer, among women in all over the word. According to the studies, performed in Iran, many of women with breast cancer refer to physician in advanced stages and the time between call to physician and finding of symptoms, is prolonged. We believe, if women in Iran (more specifically Ahvazian women) have knowledge about breast self-examination (BSE) this scenario may not occur. The aim of this study was to assessment the knowledge about BSE among women higher than 18 years in Ahvaz. For this aim, a 14-item questionnaire was distributed among 400 women referring to 10 health care centers in different regions of Ahvaz. The responses were collected and analyzed with SPSS software. The results showed that 32.3 % of participated women had no information about BSE, 41.8% of them had little information, and just 26% of them had acceptable level of information. A significant association was found between knowledge about BSE with age, level of education, and income. However, no association was found between knowledge about BSE with marital status, positive family history of breast cancer and past history of breast diseases. Higher level knowledge about BSE was found among those given education about BSE and those who had regular visits to health care centers.the majority of Ahvazian women had little or no information about BSE and that the screening program in this region is not very succeful. It is hoped that educational programs on BSE and encouragement of women to visit health cenres before the age of 40 may help in early detection and reduce the morbidity and mortality associated with breast cancer.