Faculty Bibliography

The purpose of this paper is to document the breast and cervical cancer screening practices of a community sample of South Asian women living in the New York City area. A convenience sample of 98 women was engaged in face-to-face interviews regarding their socio-demographic characteristics and cancer screening utilization. Sixty-seven percent of women had ever had a Pap test; 54% had one in the last 3 years. Seventy percent of women over 40 had ever had a mammogram; 56% had one in the last 2 years. Sixty-six percent of women had knowledge of breast self-exam (BSE); 34% of women ever practiced BSE. Multiple logistic regression analysis indicated that insurance status was a significant predictor of ever having a Pap test or mammogram, receiving timely Pap tests, and ever practicing BSE. Education was a significant predictor of ever having a Pap test and having knowledge of BSE. Marital status was a predictor of receiving timely Pap tests, and having spent more time in the U.S. was a predictor of ever practicing BSE. The study concludes that increased educational efforts must be developed targeting immigrant South Asian women of low socioeconomic status with limited access to healthcare

Since its inception in April 2000, the New York Asian American Network for Cancer Awareness, Research, and Training (NY AANCART) has conducted cancer control education, research, and infrastructure-building activities in collaboration with the agenda of the national AANCART project, one of the Special Population Networks funded by the National Cancer Institute. In New York, the AANCART program was developed based on the principles of community-based participatory research (CBPR), a research approach that is centered on community strengths and issues and that engages the community in the research process. NY AANCART has been dedicated to developing leadership within and collaboration with community-based organizations (CBOs) to address the needs of medically underserved New York Asian-American populations. In particular, NY AANCART has worked with CBOs to develop and implement a diverse public health agenda that addresses the concerns of the communities that are served by these organizations. Using case studies from two community-based partnerships that were developed by NY AANCART, the current report describes how the principles of CBPR were applied in two rapidly growing Asian-American communities in New York City