Effectiveness of educational intervention on cervical cancer screening knowledge, attitude, and practice among Yemeni immigrant women in Klang Valley, Malaysia: a randomized controlled trial

TL;DR

An online education program improved Yemeni immigrant women's knowledge, attitudes, and cervical cancer screening practices in Malaysia.

Contribution

This study evaluates an educational intervention's effectiveness for immigrant women's cervical cancer screening using the Health Belief Model.

Findings

The intervention group showed a 51% screening practice rate versus 9% in the control group.

Significant improvements were seen in knowledge, perceived benefits, and health motivation post-intervention.

Barriers to screening decreased significantly after the educational program.

Abstract

Cervical cancer is one of the leading causes of cancer-related deaths worldwide. Despite the fact that several studies have looked at the topic among women in various countries, few studies have attempted to address the significance of cervical cancer screening among immigrant women. This study aims to develop and evaluate the effectiveness of an educational intervention on knowledge, attitude, and practice of cervical screening among Yemeni immigrant women in Klang Valley, Malaysia. The intervention was guided by the Health Belief Model.

One hundred and ten Yemeni immigrant women participated in a randomized controlled trial in Klang Valley, Malaysia. The participants were randomly assigned to either the intervention group or the control group. An online health education program on cervical cancer and cervical screening was given to the intervention group participants. Data was gathered at the baseline, immediately after the intervention, and then again 3 months later. Generalized estimating equations (GEE) were used to analyze the data using IBM SPSS software 25.0 in order to evaluate the differential changes over time.

The results of the study show that there was a significant improvement in cervical cancer screening practice between the intervention (51%) and control groups (9%). In addition, there was a significant improvement in the mean scores of knowledge (0.04 to 0.628), perceived susceptibility (2.82 to 3.652), perceived seriousness (3.02 to 3.650), perceived benefits (2.5 to 3.777), health motivation (2.98 to 3.609) after the intervention compared with the scores before the intervention. Besides, there has been a significant decrease in the barriers to screening (3.6 to 2.795).

Online educational intervention was effective in improving women’s knowledge, attitudes, and practices regarding cervical cancer and its screening.

This trial is registered with the Australian New Zealand Clinical Trials Registry (ANZCTR) number ACTRN12622001445763 on 11/11/2022.

The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s13063-025-08832-8.

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