|
Description:
|
Colorectal cancer (CRC ) continues to affect African Americans disproportionately . Despite medical advances and widely accepted screening recommendations , African Americans are less likely to get appropriate CRC screening , and consequently , are more likely to die from colorectal cancer than their white counterparts . Appropriate communication between the patient and the provider and the need for increased patient education may be a part of the solution to this discouraging problem . Increasing provider education and cultural awareness may increase CRC screening among African Americans . The objective of this Capstone was to perform a systematic review of the published literature to assess the effectiveness of interventions aimed to increase participation in colorectal cancer screening among African Americans . Seven online databases were systematically searched for articles published between January 2000 and December 2007 , using subject terms taken from the Medical Subject Headings (MeSH ) , the list of standardized descriptors used by the National Library of Medicine (NLM ) , to standardize the search . Studies that measured CRC screening rates and met the inclusion /exclusion criteria were selected . Data was extracted and independently reviewed by three reviewers . Study design , population characteristics , experimental intervention , control intervention and outcomes were extracted from the selected articles . Of the 392 studies identified , seven articles were selected for this review . Four articles reported the use of culturally tailored interventions and three articles did not use culturally tailored interventions . Two studies had interventions aimed at physician education . Three articles reported statistically significant results . Because of the limited number of quality studies , no conclusive recommendations can be made regarding the contribution of culturally tailored interventions towards increasing CRC screening among African Americans . |