Assessment, awareness and practices regarding breast cancer and its screening methods amongst school teachers of a rural district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Pakistan

Background
Breast cancer is one of the most frequent cancers among women both developed and developing countries. This deadly disease is accelerating at a rapid pace in Pakistan. The most important strategy to detect and treat this cancer is to diagnose this disease at an earlier stage. There is a need to find out the awareness level and practices amongst different people and populations to enhance awareness level in the society.
Objectives
This survey is aimed to assess the knowledge and practices regarding breast cancer and its screening method amongst school teachers of district Swabi, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan
Materials and methods
This was a Cross-sectional survey using 22 item self-designed but validated and translated questionnaire distributed amongst 177 public school female teachers distributed in the month of February 2020 in the district of Swabi, KP province of Pakistan by using purposive sampling method. Private school teachers and incomplete questionnaire responses were excluded. Baseline information about the age, educational status, marital status and questionnaire was recorded on a printed proforma and was analyzed using SPSS-23.
Results:
All 177 participants were female with age range from 22-60 years and mean age of 36 9.37. Qualification of participants ranged from masters to Ph. D. while the number of married teachers was about 2 times that of unmarried. Most of the respondents (95%) were aware of breast cancer due to varied sources like news, media, internet, books or via friends and family. Almost half of the respondents had heard about BSE and about 64% were aware of its significance. About 40% were aware that BSE should be started from puberty to age 30. About 70% of participants were perceiving BSE as a good practice to prevent breast cancer. About 60% had heard of mammography and most of them considered it a useful tool to prevent breast cancer.
Conclusion
Most of the participants of the study had knowledge of breast cancer gained via electronic and print media and 70% were aware of BSE, while a small number of them were aware of mammography. This indicates that the female school teachers, having better educational status, have enough knowledge and practices of breast cancer detection and prevention.
Key words: Breast cancer, breast cancer screening (BSE), mammography.