Knowledge And Beliefs Of Gynaecological Cancer Among Women Visiting Battor Catholic Hospital

ABSTRACT

Introduction: Globally, every two minutes at least one woman dies from gynaecological cancer and out of these deaths about 80% are from developing countries.one major problem in developing countries especially sub-Saharan African is inadequate knowledge about gynaecological cancer. This study seeks to find out the knowledge women have about gynaecological cancer and the inaccurate data on gynaecological cancer by assessing knowledge and beliefs women visiting the Battor Catholic Hospital have on gynaecological cancers

Methods: The study adopted a descriptive and qualitative data collection approach. study with the aim of assessing the knowledge and beliefs of gynaecological cancer amongst women visiting the Battor Catholic Hospital in the North Tongo district. Four focus group discussions were held with adolescents and five in-depth interviews conducted with women diagnosed of gynaecological cancer. The results were analysed using the NVIVO software.

Results: Women visiting the Battor Catholic Hospital were found to have little knowledge about description of gynaecological cancer and had a lot of misconceptions about the symptoms, risk factors and preventive strategies associated with gynaecological cancer .Women’s beliefs about gynaecological cancer was poor and contributed to delay to screen for the various gynaecological cancers.

Some of the beliefs were also not supportive of women who undergo treatment for gynaecological cancer and tend to stigmatize women who have been diagnosed with gynaecological cancer. Women struggling with gynaecological cancer were believed to have been either cursed, bewitched or possessed by spirits. Treatment options were mostly was mostly concentrated on getting them free from these curses, witchcraft or spirits. 

Conclusion: Women visiting the Battor Catholic Hospital had little knowledge about description, symptoms and preventive strategies of gynaecological cancer.most women also believed gynaecological cancer was associated with spirits,being bewitched and being cursed.therefore more education about gynaecological cancer needs to be done in the Hospital.