Gynecology & Obstetrics
Open Access

Abstract

Breast Self-examination: Knowledge, Attitude, and Practice among Female Health Science Students at Adama Science and Technology University, Ethiopia

Mesfin Tafa Segni, Dagne Mulu Tadesse, Roza Amdemichael and Hailu Fekadu Demissie

Background: Breast cancer is the leading cause of cancer related deaths among women worldwide. Diagnosis of breast cancer at an earlier stage allows women more treatment choices and greater chance of long term survival. Breast self-examination (BSE) once a month contributes to a woman’s heightened awareness of what is normal for her. It is recommended that women over the age of 20 years perform monthly breast self-examination to detect new lumps and other changes in their breast. In view of the fact that mammography is not readily available in resource limited countries like Ethiopia, this study was designed to assess Knowledge, Attitude and Practice of regular Breast self-examination amongst female health science students of Adama science and Technology University in 2014.

Methodology: A cross-sectional study design was used to select 368 study subjects randomly. Self-administered questionnaires were used to collect information. The collected data were entered into Epi-info version 3.5.1. After cleaning the data it was exported to SPSS version 21 for further analysis. Bivariate and multivariate analyses were also performed with logistic regression to measure the association between dependent & independent variables.

Result: A total of 368 respondents participated in the study, of these, only 8.7% of them had good knowledge and 59.2% had positive attitude towards BSE. About two fifth (39.4%) of the respondents had done breast selfexaminations, from these only 9.7% of them practiced monthly. Statistically significant association was obtained only with, level of education of the participant, father’s educational level and program of enrolment.

Conclusion and recommendation: Knowledge and practice of BSE was low, even though majority of them have positive attitude. Being health was the major mentioned reasons for not doing BSE. The ministry of health is recommended to promote awareness about BSE through emergence of groups in the University, celebrating days like breast cancer day.