Project Description

       This project is funded by the American Cancer Society Margaret Ann Wise Trust Grant. We are funded from July 2001 through June 2005.

      This project, Messengers for Health on the Apsáalooke Reservation, takes place on the Apsáalooke (Crow) Reservation in Southwestern, MT.  To see the overall goals of this project, please see Project Goals. This project involves women who are natural helpers in the Crow community;  these women are called Messengers.  In July 2002, 24 Messengers attended a workshop to learn about cervical health and conducting outreach. They now are out in their communities talking with other women about cervical health and Pap tests.  They will do this for two years.  The need for this program was determined by a U.S. Department of Health and Human Services/Indian Health Service (IHS) study which stated “Extra efforts [in the area of cervical cancer] may be needed in the Billings Area, where the cervical cancer mortality rate was the highest.” 

      Messengers for Health will look at changes that occur over the four years of the project.  We will review information including changes in knowledge about cervical health and changes in the number of women who receive Pap tests that occur over the length of the program.  We will also look at information on:  experiences with and beliefs about cancer causes and cures, experiences with health care providers both within and outside of IHS, and barriers/customs around health and cancer. We will examine this knowledge and experience in two groups of 100 Crow women.  One group was interviewed in 2002 and a second different group of 100 Crow women will be given an interview in two years.  This will show us changes before and after our program is conducted. These two sets of interviews will be looked at for differences in knowledge of Pap tests, of the way to obtain Pap tests, of the recommended frequency of Pap tests, and of benefits of regular cervical health screening.  We will review differences in the proportion of women with knowledge of cervical cancer risk factors and the proportion of women with knowledge of cervical cancer treatment options.  We will also look to see if a greater proportion of women are getting Pap tests. The information gathered from the survey is being used to better target our outreach efforts.

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