Grant to help Hispanic women get Pap smears – New Mexico

Hispanic women have higher rates of invasive cervical cancer (16.2 per 100,000) than any other group except Vietnamese, according to the Baylor College of Medicine’s Intercultural Cancer Council. The ICC also says cervical cancer in Mexican-American and Puerto Rican women two to three times higher among Latinas than Caucasian women.

Many factors have been blamed for Hispanic women not getting Pap smears. Poverty, a lack of access to health care, lack of insurance and ignorance of the importance of cervical checkups are perhaps the most common reasons. But Hugo Vilchis, director of New Mexico State University’s Border Epidemiology and Environmental Health Center, says the significant role of culture is often overlooked.”*

*From: www.lcsun-news.com
Traducido: usando Google o Altavista/Babel Fish

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