Knowledge and Practice of Breast Self-Examination among Female Outpatients of Wesley Guild Hospital, Ilesa, Osun State, Nigeria

Introduction: A breast self-examination is an inspection of the breast done alone to help increase breast awareness, with the use of the eyes and hands to determine if there are any changes to the look and feel the breast. The study aimed to assess the knowledge and practice of breast self-examination among female outpatients in Wesley Guild Hospital, Ilesa.
Methodology: A descriptive research design was used in this study and random sampling technique was used to recruit 153 respondents. The theoretical framework used for the study was health belief model(HBM). A validated structured questionnaire with Cronbach’s alpha reliability ranged from 0.715 to 0.775, was used for the study. The responses were analyzed with descriptive statistics using SPSS Version 25 and the hypothesis stated was tested using chi square.
Result: Majority of respondents were aged 18–30 years, 95(62.1%) of the respondents have high level of knowledge, 86(56.2%) of the respondents have high level of practice. The factors influencing the practice of breast self-examination are; lack of know-how 76(49.8%), culture 49(32.0%), busy 88(57.5%), forgetfulness 102(66.7%), no symptoms 101(60%), uncomfortable 68(44.4%), scared of breast cancer diagnosis 97(63.4%), and no enough information on media 108(70.6%). There is significant relationship between marital status (p=0.000), Ethnicity (p=0.006), Educational level (p=0.025), occupation (p=0.001), level of knowledge (P= 0.000, X2=24.051a) and practice of breast self-examination among female outpatients of Wesley Guild Hospital, Ilesa.
Conclusion: Majority of the respondents have high level of knowledge and practice of self-breast examination. Therefore, nurses should develop culturally appropriate educational materials to address the cultural beliefs that discourage women from practicing BSE.

Breast-Self Examination, Knowledge, Perception, Practice

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