A PILOT STUDY ON BREAST CANCER AWARENESS AND ITS RELATIONSHIP TO ABO BLOOD GROUP AMONGST NIGERIAN WOMEN

Breast cancer is a major global health problem and a leading cause of death among women of all ethnic and racial background. With an estimated 1.15 million new cases diagnosed worldwide per year, there is an urgent need to develop a global strategy to reduce the burden of breast cancer. Based on this, a pilot study was conducted with the aim of accessing the level of its awareness in the Nigerian adult females and its relationship to ABO blood group and genotype. Two hundred and thirty-nine adult (239) females within the age range of 20-80 were used for this study. Of the 239 females, 100 of them (married and single) were issued questionnaires so as to ascertain their awareness of breast cancer in the society. These hundred females were mostly students of the University Of Port Harcourt, Nigeria. The remaining 139 females were adults diagnosed of breast cancer as revealed by their accessed files from the Department of female Surgical Ward of the University Of Port Harcourt Teaching Hospital, Rivers State- Nigeria. The blood group and genotype of the patients were thereafter noted. The retrieved data was then presented in a tabular form based on age range, breast cancer and ABO blood group. Of the 100 subjects issued questionnaires, 85% agreed of been aware of breast cancer. All the patients with breast cancer were seen to fall within the blood group A, B and O of which all were rhesus positive. Of blood group A, 55 and 14 of the patients had genotype AA and AS respectively. Unlike other studies, the age range of breast cancer recorded was from 20-29 with the least age of breast cancer subject noticed being 26 years. The age range of 30-39 years recorded the highest no of 39 patients while the least was 70-79 years with only 4 of the patients diagnosed with breast cancer. No patient with blood group AB was observed to have been linked to breast cancer in the interim so far in this study. However, blood group A+, B+ and O + revealed breast cancer patients to be 69, 22, and 48 respectively with blood group A+ being the highest.