Yu Foo Qing, Murugiah Muthu Kumar, Khan Amer Hayat, Mehmood Tahir
School of Pharmacy, Monash University, Bandar Sunway, Selangor, Malaysia E-mail :
Asian Pac J Cancer Prev. 2015;16(1):145-52. doi: 10.7314/apjcp.2015.16.1.145.
Barriers to health seeking constitute a challenging issue in the treatment of breast cancer. The current meta- synthesis aimed to explore common barriers to health seeking among Malaysian breast cancer patients. From the systematic search, nine studies were found meeting the inclusion criteria. Data extraction revealed that health behavior towards breast cancer among Malaysia women was influenced by knowledge, psychological, sociocultural and medical system factors. In terms of knowledge, most of the Malaysian patients were observed to have cursory information and the reliance on the information provided by media was limiting. Among psychological factors, stress and sense of denial were some of the common factors leading to delay in treatment seeking. Family member's advice, cultural beliefs towards traditional care were some of the common sociocultural factors hindering immediate access to advanced medical diagnosis and care. Lastly, the delay in referral was one of the most common health system-related problems highlighted in most of the studies. In conclusion, there is an immediate need to improve the knowledge and understanding of Malaysian women towards breast cancer. Mass media should liaise with the cancer specialists to disseminate accurate and up-to-date information for the readers and audience, helping in modification of cultural beliefs that hinder timing health seeking. However, such intervention will not improve or rectify the health system related barriers to treatment seeking. Therefore, there is an immediate need for resource adjustment and training programs among health professional to improve their competency and professionalism required to develop an efficient health system.
寻求医疗服务的障碍是乳腺癌治疗中一个具有挑战性的问题。当前的元综合研究旨在探索马来西亚乳腺癌患者寻求医疗服务的常见障碍。通过系统检索，发现有9项研究符合纳入标准。数据提取显示，马来西亚女性对乳腺癌的健康行为受到知识、心理、社会文化和医疗系统因素的影响。在知识方面，观察到大多数马来西亚患者只有粗略的信息，而且对媒体提供信息的依赖有限。在心理因素方面，压力和否认感是导致延迟寻求治疗的一些常见因素。家庭成员的建议、对传统护理的文化信仰是阻碍立即获得先进医疗诊断和护理的一些常见社会文化因素。最后，转诊延迟是大多数研究中突出的最常见的与医疗系统相关的问题之一。总之，迫切需要提高马来西亚女性对乳腺癌的认识和理解。大众媒体应与癌症专家合作，为读者和观众传播准确和最新的信息，帮助改变阻碍及时寻求医疗服务的文化信仰。然而，这种干预并不能改善或纠正与医疗系统相关的寻求治疗的障碍。因此，迫切需要对卫生专业人员进行资源调整和培训计划，以提高他们发展高效医疗系统所需的能力和专业水平。
