The Effect of Simulation-Assisted Breast Cancer Education on Health Beliefs and Breast Self-Examination Practices in Young Adults

The most frequent cancer in women is breast cancer, which is a major global public health concern. Increasing cancer awareness and routine breast self-examination are important steps for early diagnosis. The aim of this study is to increase knowledge and practice attitudes regarding breast examination through simulation and peer support. The research had a pre-test-post-test design and was conducted with 138 university students. “Personal Information Form” and “Champion Health Belief Model Scale in Breast Cancer Screening” were used as data collection tools. Data were analyzed with SPSS 22.0 Windows package program. Shapiro-Wilk test to determine the normal distribution of variables, "Kruskal Wallis H Test" for differences between three or more groups, "Wilcoxon Sign Test" was used. After the intervention, a significant increase was observed in the sub-dimensions of the health belief model scale, including sensitivity, severity, benefit and health motivation, as well as the perceived benefits of breast self-examination and self-efficacy levels (p