Research Article Awareness Levels about Breast Cancer Risk Factors, Early Warning Signs, and Screening and Therapeutic Approaches among Iranian Adult Women: A large Population Based Study Using Latent Class Analysis

License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. Background and Objective. Breast cancer (BC) continues to be a major cause of morbidity andmortality among women throughout the world and in Iran. Lack of awareness and early detection program in developing country is a main reason for escalating the mortality.Thepresent researchwas conducted to assess the Iranianwomen’s level of knowledge about breast cancer risk factors, early warning signs, and therapeutic and screening approaches, and their correlated determinants. Methods. In a cross-sectional study, 2250 women before participating at a community based screening and public educational program in an institute of cancer research in Isfahan, Iran, in 2012 were investigated using a self-administered questionnaire about risk factors, early warning signs, and therapeutic and screening approaches of BC. Latent class regression as a comprehensive statistical method was used for evaluating the level of knowledge and its correlated determinants. Results. Only 33.2%, 31.9%, 26.7%, and 35.8 % of study participants had high awareness levels about screening approaches, risk factors, early warning signs and therapeutic modalities of breast cancer, respectively, and majority had poor to moderate knowledge levels. Most effective predictors of high level of awareness were higher educational qualifications, attending in screening and public educational programs, personal problem, and family history of BC, respectively. Conclusion. Results of current study indicated that the levels of awareness among study population about key element