141st APHA Annual Meeting and Exposition

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Recorded Annual Meeting Presentations (RAMP) are now available for purchase.
Only $90 for presenters, $140 for registered attendees and $200 for non-attendees.

Online Program

275927
Addressing barriers to mammography for women with intellectual disabilities


Wednesday, November 6, 2013 : 8:30 a.m. - 8:45 a.m.

Joanne Wilkinson, MD, MSc, Department of Family Medicine, Boston University School of Medicine/Boston Medical Center, Boston, MA
Nechama Greenwood, CPM, MA, Department of Family Medicine, Boston University School of Medine, Boston, MA
Women with intellectual disabilities (ID) constitute an underserved population with respect to primary health care access and rates of screening and preventive care. In particular, women with ID are only half as likely to have a mammogram as women without ID in Massachusetts, despite living to an average age of 68. Women with ID have the same breast cancer rates as the general population but approximately double the mortality; some of this may be related to late diagnosis. In this presentation, we will briefly summarize the results of two mixed-method studies to define and explore barriers to mammography for women with ID. We will then describe a study to develop and test a media-based educational intervention regarding mammography for women with ID. We first developed and performed psychometric testing on an instrument to measure ‘preparedness' for mammography, or logistical knowledge about the specifics of getting a mammogram; then we tested the effect of our media-based educational intervention on preparedness in a sample of women with ID. Preliminary results indicate that our instrument has good reliability and validity and that preparedness scores improved among women with ID who received the intervention.

Learning Areas:

Administer health education strategies, interventions and programs
Conduct evaluation related to programs, research, and other areas of practice
Diversity and culture
Provision of health care to the public
Public health or related public policy
Social and behavioral sciences

Learning Objectives:
Describe 3 barriers and 3 facilitators to regular mammography screening for women with intellectual disabilities Discuss at least 2 strategies for increasing the rate of mammography screening amongst women with intellectual disabilities

Keyword(s): Breast Cancer Screening, Health Promotion

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

Qualified on the content I am responsible for because: I am a primary care physician and researcher and I have been PI of several federally funded studies that address primary care access and cancer screening for adults with intellectual disabilities. My primary research interest is increasing primary care access for disability and low literacy populations, with a focus on women with intellectual disabilities. I have published several papers related to cancer screening for women with intellectual disabilities, though this study is unpublished.
Any relevant financial relationships? No

I agree to comply with the American Public Health Association Conflict of Interest and Commercial Support Guidelines, and to disclose to the participants any off-label or experimental uses of a commercial product or service discussed in my presentation.

Back to: 5037.0: Improving health outcomes for women with disabilities