Câncer de mama e colo de útero: análise do acesso aos métodos de rastreio em Caicó

According to INCA, the estimate for Brazil for the three-year period 2020-2022 was 625,000 new cases of cancer per year. In women, breast cancer (29.7%) and cervical cancer (7.4%) are among the main cancers, with an estimate that breast cancer causes 15% of deaths from all types of câncer, and cervical cancer causes approximately 530,000 cases and 275,000 deaths each year. Some types of cancer have screening methods that can diagnose them at an early stage, such as breast cancer, for which the Ministry of Health recommends screening with mammography, in women between 50 and 69 years old, and cervical cancer, for which the recommendation is to perform the cytopathological examination in women aged 25 to 64 years. Considering that cancer is in the group of the four diseases that kills the most early, that its incidence has been increasing due to population aging, that not all types have effective prevention methods and that some have simple and cheap early screening methods, it is questionable whether the population comprised in the age groups recommended by the Ministry of Health for the screening of breast and cervical cancers have adequate coverage of such exams. This work aims to evaluate the population coverage of the screening methods available for breast and cervical cancer of the female population recommended for screening in Caicó/RN from 2014 to 2020. In this municipality, a large population coverage of mammography exams was observed, being similar to the RN and both are superior to the other regions. In the association between the percentage of mammograms performed in the analyzed period and the percentage of deaths from breast cancer in relation to the total number of mammograms performed, for the four regions analyzed, statistically significant, inversely proportional and strong correlations were identified between these variables. These results mean that in the analyzed period, when there was an increase in the percentage of exams performed, there was a decrease in the percentage of deaths from this ...