Articles & News on Appalachian Health [View all]

I've started this thread for Appalachian health reports. Articles don't have to be recent "news" to be posted here.

http://www.cfah.org/hbns/2013/women-in-appalachia-have-higher-rates-of-late-stage-breast-cancer
Women in Appalachia Have Higher Rates of Late Stage Breast Cancer
Release Date: September 26, 2013 | By Glenda Fauntleroy, HBNS Contributing Writer
Research Source: Health Services Research

Older women living in the poorest areas of Appalachia in the U.S. fail to get regular breast cancer screening and have a higher incidence of later stage breast cancer, reports a new study in Health Services Research.

About 25 million people live in the 13 states that make up the Appalachian region, a 205,000-square-mile region that follows the spine of the Appalachian Mountains from southern New York to northern Mississippi. The National Cancer Institute has recently publicized Appalachia’s higher rates of cancer and poorer outcomes for residents diagnosed with cancer.

To examine regional disparities in breast cancer screening and diagnosis, researchers evaluated Central Cancer Registry and Medicare claims data from three Appalachian states (Kentucky, Ohio, and Pennsylvania) to measure the incidence of later stage breast cancer in the region’s poorest counties compared with its more affluent counties. The counties’ economic statuses were compared based on factors such as unemployment rates, average home values and average monthly wages.

Women living in the most economically deprived counties—located in eastern Kentucky and southeastern Ohio—had 3.31 times as many late-stage tumors compared to those in the least deprived counties. Appalachian women in the study over age 65 had a 17.3 percent incidence of later stage breast cancer compared to a national average of 16 percent for women of the same age.... MORE