COLUMBUS – A woman who has seen a loved one or close friend die of cancer is more likely to take an aggressive approach to prevention than those who witnessed their relatives or friends survive, according to a study from Ohio State.
“Women who had traumatic experiences were more likely to view breast cancer as a death sentence while those with more positive experiences perceived it as a hardship, but one that could be overcome,” said Tasleem Padamsee, an assistant professor of health services management and policy and lead author of the study, which was supported by the National Cancer Institute appears in the Journal of Health Psychology.
In Padamsee’s study, women in the three study groups who had not lived through a traumatic cancer experience with a loved one were generally oriented toward mammography as a prevention tool and were open to the idea of genetic testing but, overall, were not interested in more aggressive options unless a genetic test confirmed a predisposition to breast cancer.
Padamsee, who is also part of the OSU Comprehensive Cancet Center, said she was troubled that some of the women were not aware of prevention options for which they would be potential candidates and that many said that financial barriers stood in the way of their pursuit of genetic testing.