Abstract PS10-05: Door-to-door Breast Cancer Screening in 22,278 populaces from Feb. 2020-April 2024: Breast Cancer Hub's Trendsetting Grassroots Sustainable Solutions, overcoming the Disparity, & Challenges in the Rural Remote Villages in Povert

Abstract Background: There is a huge gap in Breast Cancer survival globally with the death rate being significantly higher in developing countries due to taboo, ignorance, lack of awareness, sociocultural, economic, and environmental barriers, leading to inaccessibility to healthcare facilities, proper guidance, and treatment management. Healthcare providers in rural India regularly see women coming in an advanced stage and in Assam, Northeast (NE) India, the situation is grimmer. This study is based on an analysis of the database of door-to-door Breast cancer screening of the rural villages in Assam from February 2020 to April 2024, reporting the Breast Cancer Screening status, disparities leading to late detection and death, and the success of Breast Cancer Hub’s Grassroots approach, providing sustainable solutions. Methods: In this study, we report the data from February 2020 to April 2024 (N=22,278), of in-person Door-to-Door Breast Cancer Screening by Breast Cancer Hub (BCH), a nonprofit organization in the remote 18 villages in Assam, India. BCH-generated questionnaire on health and lifestyle, family history, demography, socio-economic condition and other determining conditions. The data was incorporated from notebook used by BCH teams in the field, into Excel sheets. A complete descriptive statistics is used for understanding the data. For goodness of fit test, chi square is used. All the analysis have been compiled with the help of SPSS version 21. Results: This is the pioneering study, as BCH is the first group to conduct door-to-door Breast Cancer Screening in N=22,278 villagers (8085 families), in the underprivileged rural Seventeen villages and One Tea Garden Estate in Assam. From our evaluation, we confirm that the awareness of Breast Cancer Symptoms was <1% among the villagers. The Breast Self-Exam was performed by 0% of the populace. No participant (0%) underwent Clinical Breast Exam. Women 40 years and above, never performed screening mammograms (0%) or ultrasounds (0%) but only visited the hospital when the symptoms were extremely severe eventually getting diagnosed at a late stage leading to death. We investigated the socio-economic condition and huge barrier to care due to financial constraints, villagers living on a daily wage and health always took the last priority as they fall below the poverty line. In addition, the lifestyle is influenced by the tremendous intake of tobacco in all forms, especially adding tobacco, betel nut, slaked lime, and other ingredients to the betel leaves and chewing in the form of Paan. We encountered 76 suspicious cases, that needed further evaluation and screening. But, during screening, the team faced challenges, as the villagers could not financially afford to travel to cancer diagnosis-equipped hospitals which are extremely far away, leading them to succumb to faith healers and eventually death. The family members avoided taking patients to hospitals as it would be a full-day affair and they couldn’t miss their daily wage, as food is their priority. Also, they were not aware of government healthcare cards for the Below Poverty Line population. Therefore, BCH created a sustainable framework, by teaching every member Breast Self-Examination (BSE), providing BSE card in local language, accompanying suspicious cases to hospitals, providing transport, generating villagers’ income certificates and health cards, helping with hospital registration, patient communication with healthcare professionals, providing Aid for diagnosis and treatment not covered under the government schemes, dropping patients home with follow-ups, counseling, support, taking the same patients back to the hospital on the next appointments, assisting with the comprehensive treatment process, case by case. Discussion: BCH is the trendsetter to execute this framework in the untapped villages in India, revolutionizing the Breast cancer scenario, and driving impactful changes in Breast Cancer survival. Citation Format: Lopamudra Das Roy. Door-to-door Breast Cancer Screening in 22,278 populaces from Feb. 2020-April 2024: Breast Cancer Hub's Trendsetting Grassroots Sustainable Solutions, overcoming the Disparity, & Challenges in the Rural Remote Villages in Poverty, of Assam, India [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium 2024; 2024 Dec 10-13; San Antonio, TX. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Clin Cancer Res 2025;31(12 Suppl):Abstract nr PS10-05.