Endocrine Abstracts

Objective: Cancer is an important public health problem. Cancer screening is effective method in fight against cancer. In addition to an increased risk for cancer incidence there is some evidence in the literature reporting that patients with diabetes have a lower rate of cancer screening and survival than non-diabetic patients. In this study, we aimed to assess the awareness of cancer screening programmes in diabetic patients who admitted to our outpatient clinic.

Materials and methods: This study was carried out using a questionnaire method as a cross-sectional case-controlled study to question cancer screening awareness in patients diagnosed with diabetes who admitted to the our outpatient clinic between September 2019 and February 2020. A poll including questions regarding age, gender, educational status, smoking/ alcohol use and whether they underwent any cancer screening programme was conducted to the patients who accepted to take part in the study.

Results: 83 patients participated in this study. Sixty-seven (68.6%) of 83 patientswere female,16 (31.8%) of them were male. Among all patients, the proportion of patients who had all the recommended cancer screenings appropriate for their age was determined to be 3.3%. The average age of male patients was 57. And, the rates of male patients who underwent PSA measurement, colonoscopy, fecal occult blood test were 50.0%, 25.0% and 37.5%, respectively. The average age of women was 55. It was found that women diagnosed with diabetes complied the least with HPV testing, and the most with breast examinations, mammography and breast ultrasound. The rates of female patients who underwentHPV testing, colonoscopy, fecal occult blood testing, pap-smear, mammography /breast ultrasound and breast examination were 9.1%, 29.9%, 34.3%, 65.7%, 70.1% and 70.1%, respectively.

Conclusions: In our study, it was observed that the rates of participation in cancer screening in patients with diabetes were low. It is noteworthy that despite frequent admissions of diabetic patients to hospitals for routine controls, the rates of participation in cancer screening programmes are low. Informing diabetic patients about cancer screening programmes and encouraging them to undertake necessary screening tests during their controls may be effective in terms of early diagnosis and treatment modalities.