Purpose: To determine nurse practitioners' (NPs') knowledge and reported practices regarding breast cancer screening in a climate of conflicting guidelines.
Data source: A descriptive, cross-sectional survey design was used to examine approaches to cancer screening among NPs in western New York.
Conclusions: Among the 175 NP respondents, agreement with the accepted answers for the individual breast cancer-screening items ranged from 51% to 80%; responses did not vary by age group or gender. Overall, 54% demonstrated agreement with three or more of four breast cancer-screening items.
Implications for practice: These findings suggest the need to implement educational interventions as one means of decreasing variation in breast cancer screening among NPs. Also, the development and endorsement of a single set of evidence-based breast cancer-screening guidelines would promote adoption of a single screening recommendation.