Campeonas Breast Health Outreach

Background of the Campeonas Project

Because breast-cancer screening has not increased as much for Latinas as it has for women of other communities in the United States, the Foundation offers the Campeonas project to help address this problem. Breast-health education and outreach are important to a comprehensive screening program, and evaluation has shown several interventions to increase screening, among them patient navigation and one-on-one education.

The Foundation developed the Campeonas project as a culturally appropriate educational outreach emphasizing the cultural values of familismo and personalismo for Latinas of screening age. It was designed for use with the ¡Celebremos la vida! breast and cervical cancer screening program, started by the Foundation in 1994 in Washington, DC, and it can be easily used with similar programs serving Latinas.

Formative Research

Formative research with Latinas age 40 and older through the design and development of the Campeonas project is one of its greatest strengths, to ensure that the project produced useful and effective tools for the Latina community:

• Sixty intercept interviews early in the project for reasons to get screened and barriers to screening (at churches and Hispanic groceries in the DC metro area)
• Two focus groups (16 women total: one group of women who had been screened for breast cancer and one of women who hadn’t been screened)
• Usability studies (an early group-based study of six and later in-home studies with nine individuals)
• Pilot-testing (two four-hour trainings and 6 weeks of community-level work of 22 Campeonas)

At each point, the data were analyzed and the findings integrated into the development of the training and materials.

Acknowledgments

The 2011–2012 Campeonas design and development team included:

Sarah Abou-El-Seoud, Prevent Cancer Foundation, Alexandria, VA

Lily Echeverría, Spanish Catholic Center, Washington, DC

María Gloria Elliott, MA Ed & HD, Consultant, Washington, DC

Kristina Hunken, MA, formerly at the Prevent Cancer Foundation, Alexandria, VA

Dorys Peraza, MA, Spanish Catholic Center, Silver Spring, MD

Karen J. Peterson, PhD, Prevent Cancer Foundation, Alexandria, VA

Olga Pulgar-Vidal, MS, MPH, Spanish Catholic Center, Washington, DC

Juan Ramos, Olé Advertising, Baltimore, MD

María Ivonne Rivera, MPH, Rivera Group, Washington, DC

Enrique S. Rivera-Torres, MGA, Rivera Group, Washington, DC

Suzette M. Smith, MBA, Consultant, Alexandra, VA

Mary Jo Vazquez, MS, Consultant, Silver Spring, MD

Melissa Werner, MPH, MAT, Consultant, Washington, DC

Mary Wozniak, MPH, formerly at the Spanish Catholic Center, Washington, DC

The project team benefited from the community’s enthusiastic support, in the sharing of ideas and suggestions and in providing in-kind contributions. The team would like to recognize the important community perspectives provided by the Advisory Committee for Cancer Champions whose members included:  Gabriela Arevalo, Camille Bobb-Semple, Marcela Campoli, Janet Canar,  Modesta Castaneda, Noel Castaneda, Elizabeth Hernandez Lopez, Teresa Madrid and Edda Varona.

The Foundation would also like to express its appreciation to Susan G. Komen® for its generous support of the Campeonas project as part of the ¡Celebremos la vida! program.