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“Cancer Education on Wheels,” a Novel Cost-Effective Method in Creating Awareness in the Community: a Pilot Study

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Abstract

Cancer education raises disease awareness, the value of early identification and importantly the need for prompt screening and treatment when diagnosed. In this study, an effort was made to understand how well a unique cancer education program, “Cancer Education on Wheels,” transfers knowledge in general public in society. The community was shown prerecorded cancer awareness videos using a TV monitor, CD player, and speaker system mounted on an eight-seat Toyota Innova. Before and after seeing the video presentation, consenting volunteers filled out questionnaires asking about demographics and understanding of cancer. Frequency and percentage calculations were done on the demographic information and a Wilcoxon signed-rank test was run on the overall subject score. Data was stratified based on demographic information and compared by applying Kruskal–Wallis test and Mann–Whitney test. p values under 0.05 were regarded as significant. A total of 584 people completed the pre-test and post-test questionnaires. The Wilcoxon signed-rank test revealed a difference between the pre-test and post-test (3.29 ± 2.48 vs. 6.78 ± 3.52; P = 0.0001). The pre-test results showed that volunteers between the ages of 18 and 30; men; students; urban residents; single volunteers; graduates; people who had known a person/or family member with cancer; and people who were aware of the suffering cancer causes had a high baseline knowledge of cancer (p = 0.015 to 0.001). The post-test results show that participants who had less baseline scores like housewives and unemployed people performed better (p = 0.006 to 0.0001). The findings unambiguously demonstrated that “Cancer Education on Wheels” was successful in raising participants’ awareness of cancer signs and screening. Additionally, the findings showed that volunteers who were aged, married, housewives, and unemployed had higher scores. Most importantly, this approach to cancer education is simple to organize and carry out in a local setting. It is also affordable and simple to execute using readily available technological equipment and manageable logistics. According to the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study to use “Cancer Education on Wheels” to spread awareness of cancer throughout the neighborhood especially in budget constrained areas.

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Data available on request from the corresponding authors.

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Acknowledgements

The authors are also grateful to all the participants who volunteered to take part in the study.

Funding

The study was supported by Mangalore Institute of Oncology.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Radiation Oncology, Mangalore Institute of Oncology, Pumpwell, Mangalore, 575002, Karnataka, India

    Suresh Rao

  2. Cancer Education and Awareness Cell, Mangalore Institute of Oncology, Pumpwell, Mangalore, 575002, Karnataka, India

    Pratima Rao, Rajesh Shetty, Nithesh Chandra Gatty & Durgadas Adappa

  3. Department of Community Medicine, Father Muller Medical College, Kankanady, Mangalore, India

    Sucharitha Suresh

  4. Research Unit, Mangalore Institute of Oncology, Pumpwell, Mangalore, 575002, Karnataka, India

    Manjeshwar Shrinath Baliga

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  1. Suresh Rao
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Correspondence to Manjeshwar Shrinath Baliga.

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This was a prospective study ad was conducted after obtaining clearance from Institutional Ethics Committee (MIO/IEC/11/2015). Written informed consent was taken from all the study participants.

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Rao, S., Rao, P., Shetty, R. et al. “Cancer Education on Wheels,” a Novel Cost-Effective Method in Creating Awareness in the Community: a Pilot Study. J Canc Educ 38, 1792–1800 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13187-023-02334-4

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