Abstract
Changes in the organisation of health care have dominated policy initiatives over the past two decades in many countries. An increasing reliance on public health initiatives to prevent or detect disease early has resulted in an increase in programs that screen for cancer in the community. In turn, this accentuates the need to persuasively communicate the value of such initiatives to encourage continued participation. Merely placing screening programs into a community setting is not sufficient to ensure that adequate numbers will voluntarily participate regularly to achieve anticipated cost and mortality savings in the population. In this research the influence of managing communication in a public screening mammography program was investigated. The results revealed that significant opportunities were overlooked for reassurance and information during the physical mammography process. In turn, this highlights the influence of constraints imposed by the structure of the screening program and the resources allocated to the process. This research suggests that it is important to address multiple influences, including ethnic differences, when asking questions about the effectiveness of public health policy, particularly when considering the choices women make about ongoing participation in breast screening programs.
Highlights
Over the past two decades, an ever-growing demand for improved quality in public health services has driven a comprehensive health sector reform process [1], including an increasing emphasis on public health care initiatives throughout the developed world [2]
Many countries, including Britain [5,6], America [7,8], Australia [9,10] and New Zealand (NZ) [11], have long advocated participation in screening mammograms which offers the best alternative for reducing mortality from breast cancer in women aged over 50 years [12,13,14,15]
As there has been considerable research about encouraging women to enroll in screening programs, it was of particular interest to this research to examine what influences shaped the way in which staff communicated with women having mammograms, and what impact the process had on participants
Summary
Over the past two decades, an ever-growing demand for improved quality in public health services has driven a comprehensive health sector reform process [1], including an increasing emphasis on public health care initiatives throughout the developed world [2]. Many countries, including Britain [5,6], America [7,8], Australia [9,10] and New Zealand (NZ) [11], have long advocated participation in screening mammograms which offers the best alternative for reducing mortality from breast cancer in women aged over 50 years [12,13,14,15]. As a direct outcome of this rationale, public health policy was introduced to provide a screening mammography program for eligible women in NZ. “What influences shape the way in which staff communicate with women having mammograms?” and second, “What impact did staff communication have on participants in the program?” were the questions which drove the research reported in this paper.
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