Barriers to Breast Cancer Screening in Arab Countries
Date
2023-05-16
Authors
Amani Alhamid
Hussein Hallak
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Al-Quds University - Deanship of Scientific Research
Abstract
Background: Breast cancer is the most common cancer affecting women worldwide. In 2020, and according to WHO, about 2.3 million women were diagnosed with breast cancer(WHO, 26 March 2021). Moreover, the highest rate of cancer mortality in women is related to breast cancer (Sung et al., 2021). Breast cancer is considered to be a public health problem in developed and developing countries. Previous studies revealed that screening can reduce the mortality rate of breast cancer, which can be done by different approaches. Moreover, the number and deaths in developing countries are increasing rapidly, and about half of the deaths are presented in these countries due to: changes in risk factors, inadequate access to breast cancer screening and deficiency of treatment (Al-Azri M, 2020, Sun, 2017). This makes early detection or screening for breast cancer a health priority. However, participation in breast cancer screening in Arab countries are considered to be very low (Alatrash, 2020). The reason for this low participation has to be studied, especially that literature on breast cancer screening in these countries is quite scarce (Donnelly et al., 2013).