The Memphis breast cancer disparity-screening program.

e12577 Background: Despite the higher incidence of breast cancer in the white population, the mortality rates are higher in blacks. This is most apparent in the city of Memphis, TN, with the largest mortality disparity of large cities. Memphis also has the distinction of having the highest number of deaths from breast cancer in Tennessee. Conventional risk factors play a role, but they do not fully explain this difference. Socioeconomic factors are contributory. The city of Memphis, which is predominantly black, has a 20% poverty level and a dismal uninsured rate. The rate of annual screening mammograms is low in this population. We hypothesized that a screening program targeted at the uninsured may help reduce the breast cancer mortality. Methods: Through a cooperative partnership between the Methodist Le Bonheur Healthcare System and West Cancer Center, we utilized the Congregational Health Network (CHN) and a Community Outcome and Relations Coordinator (CORC) to seamlessly transition participants from ...