Knowledge, attitudes, and practices related to breast cancer screening among female Jordanian university employees: A cross-sectional study.

INTRODUCTION: To improve participation in breast screening programs, the level of knowledge about BC, attitudes, and practices of women in different sections of society must be understood. This study aimed to measure the level of knowledge of BC risk factors, signs and symptoms and determine current mammography practices among female employees at Jordanian universities. METHODS: A cross-sectional descriptive study was conducted on female employees at Jordanian government universities. Data was collected using a structured questionnaire that included: sociodemographic characteristics, knowledge of BC risk factors, knowledge of BC symptoms and knowledge, attitude and practice of mammography as an early detection method. RESULTS: A total of 362 participants completed the questionnaire. Overall, 174 scored ≥50% correct answers regarding BC risk factors, while 231 scored ≥50% correct answers regarding BC signs and symptoms. Half of the participants (n = 184, 50.8%) understood mammography to be an early BC detection method. Among those participants, 95 (51.6%) were eligible for screening and 39 (21.2%) had had a previous mammogram. The main reason for not engaging in mammography was the absence of BC signs and symptoms (37.2%). Profession, educational level and family history of BC were associated with increased knowledge of BC risk factors, signs and symptoms (p = 0.01). Lecturers in medical faculties exhibited the highest level of knowledge about mammography compared to participants in other professions (p = 0.02). CONCLUSION: Only 79 participants had good to excellent knowledge about BC. Participants' profession was the major indicator for awareness of BC and mammography as an early detection method. IMPLICATIONS FOR PRACTICE: The findings of this study reinforce the importance of providing BC educational programs for university employees in Jordan to increase awareness of BC and mammography.

Knowledge, attitude, understanding and implementation of evidence-based practice among Jordanian radiographers.

INTRODUCTION: Evidence-based practice (EBP) has gained attention globally from healthcare professionals and researchers. The aim of this study was to assess Jordanian diagnostic radiographers' knowledge, attitude, education/knowledge, and skills related to EBP; and identify specific terms related to EBP. METHODS: A paper-based, self-administered questionnaire with two sections was used. The first section included 11 socio-demographic questions and the second section contained 56 questions regarding EBP categorized under seven distinct subscales. The data were imported into SPSS for analysis. RESULTS: Responses were received from 203 radiographers, most of them 135 (66.5%) aged 21-30 years. The majority of radiographers agreed or strongly agreed that the application of EBP is necessary for radiography practice, and 129 (63.6%) of radiographers learned the foundations of EBP as part of their academic preparation. Less than half of the participants stated that they completely understood the research terminology listed in the survey. Most participants had access to the internet and research databases, 79.3% (n = 161). The majority of participants, 63.1% (n = 128) stated that they always used their personal experience, as a source to make a clinical decision in radiography practice. The most common barrier to the implementation of EBP was insufficient time (63.5%, n = 129). CONCLUSION: This study showed that despite the positive attitude, and beliefs of radiographers toward EBP, and access to information resources, radiographers still need a higher level of confidence in their ability to engage in and implement EBP; including increased education to support the research skills needs to search and interpret publications. IMPLICATIONS FOR PRACTICE: The findings of this study may help inform restructure of the undergraduate radiography curriculum, training programs or other interventions required to promote or facilitate the adoption of EBP in Jordan.

Assessment and correlation between job satisfaction and burnout among radiographers.

INTRODUCTION: Previous research on job satisfaction (JS) and burnout has focused on physicians and nurses. However, limited work has evaluated radiographers' JS and burnout, factors affecting them and the correlation between them. The aim of this study is to assess the level and specific factors affecting burnout and JS among radiographers and to examine the correlation between them. METHODS: A questionnaire consisting of socio-demographic information and two validated instruments (Maslach Burnout Inventory-Human Services Survey for Medical Personnel (MBI-HSS (MP)) and JS Survey (JSS)) was distributed to radiographers. The MBI included 22 questions and JSS consisted of 36 questions. Mean scores were used to compare responses between participants according to demographic characteristics. Correlation between JS and burnout was examined using Pearson correlation test, with P < 0.05 determining statistical significance. RESULTS: 308 radiographers returned a completed questionnaire, 48.4% of participants were male, 48.7% had 1-6 years of experience and 61.4% examined >25 patients per day. Total emotional exhaustion, depersonalization and personal accomplishment scores were 28.7, 11.3 and 35.8 respectively. Most participants felt dissatisfied with pay (n = 221, 71.8%), opportunities for promotion (n = 202, 65.6%), fringe benefits (n = 239, 77.6%), contingent rewards (n = 231, 75.0%), operating procedures (n = 190, 61.7%) and communication (n = 162, 52.6%). Burnout was associated with work experience and caseload and JS was associated with section of work. Most of the JS domains were significantly inversely related to emotional exhaustion and depersonalisation domains. Emotional exhaustion and depersonalization drew a significant positive correlation. Emotional exhaustion and depersonalization drew a significant positive correlation. CONCLUSION: Participating radiographers are mostly dissatisfied about their jobs and they suffer a high level of emotional exhaustion. IMPLICATIONS FOR PRACTICE: To avoid the consequences of burnout and decreased JS on individuals and organizations, efforts should be done in alleviating the main factors affecting them.

Radiologist performance in the detection of lung cancer using CT.

AIM: To measure the level of radiologists' performance in lung cancer detection, and to explore radiologists' performance in cancer specialised and non-specialised centres. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Thirty radiologists read 60 chest computed tomography (CT) examinations. Thirty cases had surgically or biopsy-proven lung cancer and 30 were cancer-free cases. The cancer cases were validated by four expert radiologists who located the malignant lung nodules. Reader performance was evaluated by calculating sensitivity, location sensitivity, specificity, and area under the receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve (AUC). In addition, sensitivity at fixed specificity (0.794) was computed from each reader's estimated ROC curve. RESULTS: The radiologists had a mean sensitivity of 0.749, sensitivity at fixed specificity of 0.744, location sensitivity of 0.666, specificity of 0.81 and AUC of 0.846. Radiologists in the specialised and non-specialised cancer centres had the following (specialised, non-specialised) pairs of values: sensitivity=(0.80, 0.719); sensitivity for fixed 0.794 specificity=(0.752, 0.740); location sensitivity=(0.712, 0.637); specificity=(0.794, 0.82) and AUC=(0.846, 0.846). CONCLUSION: The efficacy of radiologists was comparable to other studies. Furthermore, AUC outcomes were similar for specialised and non-specialised cancer centre radiologists, suggesting they have similar discriminatory ability and that the higher sensitivity and lower specificity for specialised-centre radiologists can be attributed to them being less conservative in interpreting case images.

Digital tomosynthesis: a new future for breast imaging?

The aim of this article is to review the major limitations in current mammography and to describe how these may be addressed by digital breast tomosynthesis (DBT). DBT is a novel imaging technology in which an x-ray fan beam sweeps in an arc across the breast, producing tomographic images and enabling the production of volumetric, three-dimensional (3D) data. It can reduce tissue overlap encountered in conventional two-dimensional (2D) mammography, and thus has the potential to improve detection of breast cancer, reduce the suspicious presentations of normal tissues, and facilitate accurate differentiation of lesion types. This paper reviews the latest studies of this new technology. Issues including diagnostic efficacy, reading time, radiation dose, and level of compression; cost and new innovations are considered.