Sub-Ethnicity and Survivorship Experience: Asian American Breast Cancer Survivors.
Wonshik Chee, Eun-Ok Im
PMID 34261395WHAT IT FOUND
Among Chinese, Korean, and Japanese American breast cancer survivors, Japanese Americans reported less pain and symptom distress, better quality of life, and more use of pain and symptom management than Chinese Americans after accounting for other factors.
Key findings
01Japanese American survivors had lower adjusted pain (OR = -0.32, p < .01), lower symptom distress (β = -0.27, p < .01), and higher quality of life (β = 0.22, p = .03) than Chinese American survivors.
02Being Japanese American, compared with Chinese American, was positively associated with pain management (OR = 14.63, p = .02) and symptom management (OR = 11.17, p = .02) after other factors were held constant.
03Religion (β = -0.26, p = .01) and acculturation (β = -0.20, p = .04) were negatively associated with symptom distress; cancer type (β = 0.24, p = .01) and perceived social support (β = 0.35, p = .01) were positively associated with quality of life; urban living was positively associated with symptom management (OR = 10.08, p = .01).
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for RNs
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What it does not show
The sample was a secondary analysis of baseline data, and the number of participants was fixed by the parent study rather than chosen for these comparisons. All outcomes were self-reported, so response bias and social desirability could affect the results. Participants had to have internet access, so the sample may not represent survivors without internet access. The analysis shows associations at one time point, not causes, and it did not test the parent study intervention. The sub-ethnic groups were small, especially Korean and Japanese American participants, so findings may be unstable. The paper studied only Chinese, Korean, and Japanese American survivors, so it cannot be generalized to all Asian American survivors.
Declared interests
The supplied text does not include an author conflict-of-interest or funding statement. The article is tagged as NIH extramural research support.
The easy way to misread this
Do not conclude that Japanese American survivors inherently manage symptoms better or that sub-ethnicity causes these differences. This is a baseline secondary analysis of self-reported associations, so it cannot show why differences occur or whether any care approach changes them.