Breast-cancer awareness in low-income countries
Menée dans 135 villages de la région de Gezira au Soudan, cette étude évalue la faisabilité d'un programme de sensibilisation conduit par des volontaires féminines locales pour améliorer la détection précoce des cancers du sein
Breast cancer is a common disease across the world, affecting both wealthy and poor populations, but outcomes vary between these populations. Most women diagnosed with breast cancer in high-income countries can hold a reasonable expectation of cure and a long life expectancy. Such progress in the treatment of breast cancer is indeed one of the success stories of modern medicine, and can be attributed to screening programmes that allow early detection and to the use of multimodality treatments and systemic therapies. However, patients living in poor, rural communities, especially in low-income countries, often present to health-care facilities with advanced cancers and metastatic disease, and their disease often progresses, leading to a painful, neglected death. Late presentation and diagnosis, leading to poor prognosis, is a pressing issue in oncology, and one that needs to be dealt with urgently in view of the expected increase in the incidence of breast cancer, especially in these vulnerable and disadvantaged women...
The Lancet Oncology , commentaire en libre accès, 2012