ASPO Abstracts
Disparities in health information seeking behaviors and fatalistic views of cancer by sexual orientation: A nationally representative study of US adults
Category: Cancer Health Disparities
Conference Year: 2019
Abstract Body:
Purpose: Lesbian, gay, and bisexual (LGB) adults are at a higher risk of cancer from multiple sites. Although limited research exists to explain the disparity, we explored potential differences in access and utilization of health information, and cancer-related beliefs and behaviors. Methods: We used data from the 5th iteration of the Health Information National Trends Survey taken from January-May 2017. Using survey-weighted logistic regression we explored potential differences in health information seeking behavior, trusted sources of healthcare information, engagement with the healthcare system, awareness of cancer risk factors, cancer fatalism, cancer related health behaviors, and historical cancer screening between 117 LGB and 2857 heterosexual participants.Results: LGB participants were more likely to report looking for information about health or medical topics than heterosexual participants (adjusted odds ratio [aOR]: 3.12; 95% CI: 1.07 — 9.06), but less likely to first seek health information from a doctor (aOR: 0.17; 95% CI: 0.06 — 0.50) after adjusting for age, race, and sex. LGB persons were also less likely to report they trust receiving health or medical information from friends and family and more likely to be worried about getting cancer (aOR: 2.30; 95% CI: 1.04 — 5.05). Conclusions: Overall, our findings indicate a growing need for healthcare providers and public health promotion experts to produce tailored cancer prevention and control materials for members of sexual minority groups, but also more work is needed to understand barriers that LGB populations face in accessing this information and building informative social support networks.
Keywords: Cancer screening; cancer-related health behaviors; health disparities; sexual minority;