Breast cancer is the most common form of cancer in women and affects women across all ethnic groups. Although the psychosocial impact of breast cancer is being studied, there is little information on ethnic minorities. To better understand the breast cancer experience of Asian American women, we conducted key informant and focus group interviews. Six professionals participated in the key informant interviews. A total of 34 Asian American breast cancer survivors participated in focus group interviews, including Korean (n=10), Chinese (n=11), and a mixed Asian group (n=13). The common themes identified in this series of qualitative studies included: lack of knowledge about breast cancer; medical care issues such as cost and amount of time spent with physician; cultural factors related to beliefs about illness, gender role and family obligations (e.g. self-sacrifice) and language barriers; the importance of spirituality; and psychosocial concerns related to worry about children, burdening the family, body image and sexual health concerns. A primary source of support and coping for Asian American women with breast cancer was their spiritual beliefs. The results from this qualitative study have been used to prepare a survey instrument to examine these issues in a larger sample of Asian American women.

Results demonstrate the effectiveness of a culturally responsive, paraprofessionally delivered intervention to reduce depressive symptoms among LBC patients. Therefore, community oncology practices can affiliate with trained paraprofessionals to implement mental health services to address distress among our growing and increasingly ethnically, linguistically, and economically diverse oncology patient population.

Objective: To evaluate the impact of breast cancer and the quality of life of women survivors and to identify associations between sociodemographic and clinical variables. Method: This was a cross-sectional, analytical, quantitative study conducted with women receiving outpatient post-treatment care at a public institution of the city of São Paulo, state of São Paulo, Brazil. Instruments: sociodemographic and clinical questionnaires; Impact of Cancer scale; Functional Assessment of Cancer Therapy-Breast Cancer scale. Descriptive and analytical statistical analysis were performed. Results: One hundred women were included in the study with a mean age of 60 years (SD = 11.3); most with less than 5 years of follow-up, low purchasing power, and low education levels. Negative Impact of Cancer: Health Worry, Body Changes, Feelings, and Meaning of Cancer. Quality of life: 81.9 (18.3), specific: 105.6 (24.6). The following subscales of the impact of cancer scale predicted lower quality of life scores: Body Changes, Negative Self-Evaluation, and Concerns about Cancer (p <0.05). Conclusion: Although they presented high scores for quality of life, patients reported negative impacts of cancer, enhanced by vulnerabilities.

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Health disparities persist despite ongoing efforts. Given the United States’ rapidly changing demography and socio-cultural diversity, a paradigm shift in behavioral medicine is needed to advance research and interventions focused on health equity. This paper introduces the Con-NECT Framework as a model to link the sciences of behavioral medicine and health equity with the goal of achieving equitable health and outcomes in the twenty-first century. We first evaluate the state of health equity efforts in behavioral medicine science and identify key opportunities to advance the field. We then discuss and present actionable recommendations related to ConNECT’s five broad and synergistic principles: (1) Integrating Context; (2) Fostering a Norm of Inclusion; (3) Ensuring Equitable Diffusion of Innovations; (4) Harnessing Communication Technology; and (5) Prioritizing Specialized Training. The framework holds significant promise for furthering health equity and ushering in a new and refreshing era of behavioral medicine science and practice.

Investigating demographic characteristics and medical outcomes including HRQOL outcomes and satisfaction with care among ethnic minority YBCS is needed to advance the science as well as assist health professionals with precision care delivery. Greater translational and patient-centered research must focus on at-risk population such as YBCS to inform precision psychosocial oncology care and reduce health disparities.

Medically underserved populations in the US continue to experience higher cancer burdens of incidence, mortality and other cancer-related outcomes. It is imperative to understand how health inequities experienced by diverse population groups may contribute to our increasing unequal cancer burdens and disparate outcomes. The National Cancer Institute convened a diverse group of scientists to discuss research challenges and opportunities for cancer epidemiology in medically underserved and understudied populations. This report summarizes salient issues and discuss five recommendations from the group, including the next steps required to better examine and address cancer burden in US among our rapidly increasing diverse and understudied populations.

Background To address the fear of cancer recurrence (FCR) research gap, we used prospec-