Breast cancer screening and socioeconomic status--35 metropolitan areas, 2000 and 2002.

Studies have suggested that women with low incomes residing in metropolitan areas might be less likely to be screened for breast cancer than more affluent women residing in the same areas. However, few studies have examined the associations between breast cancer screening and both individual and area-based measures of socioeconomic status (SES) among women in metropolitan areas. To examine these associations, CDC analyzed the percentage of women who had a mammogram by using individual data (i.e., household income and education level) from the 2000 and 2002 Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS) surveys and area-based data (i.e., percentages classified as living in poverty or at a low education level) from the 2000 U.S. Census. This report summarizes the results of those analyses, which suggested that, among women in 35 metropolitan statistical areas (MSAs), those with annual household incomes of <15,000 dollars were less likely to have had a mammogram than more affluent women (especially in areas where a greater proportion of women were affluent) and those without a high school education were less likely to have had a mammogram than women with more education (especially in areas where a greater proportion of women had higher education levels). Studies are needed to determine how to increase the percentage of women having mammograms among women in low-income and low-education populations.