Video Education to Promote Skin Cancer Awareness and Identification in Spanish-speaking Patients.

ABSTRACT

Objective: We sought to evaluate the efficacy of a Spanish-language educational video in teaching primary Spanish speaking patients to recognize benign and malignant lesions and to increase their awareness about skin cancer. Materials and Methods: Thirty-seven subjects were enrolled in study. An instructional video was developed to increase knowledge of benign and malignant lesions, skin cancer awareness, and prevention among Spanish-speaking patients. Two examples each of six common skin lesions (e.g., malignant melanoma, cherry angioma, seborrheic keratosis, benign melanocytic nevus, basal cell carcinoma, and squamous cell carcinoma) were presented as high-quality images to the participants before and after watching the two-minute educational video. A pre- and postvideo survey was used to assess competency. Results: The prevideo baseline median score was six points (interquartile range [IQR] 5-6 points); postviewing median score improved to 11 points (IQR 11-12 points), which was statistically significant (Median=5 points, IQR 4-6 points; p<.001). The ability of the participants to identify nonmelanoma skin cancers improved from 74 percent to 98 percent and from 35 percent to 99 percent for squamous cell carcinoma and basal cell carcinoma. Initially, only 30 percent of participants could identify melanoma prior to viewing the video. Afterwards, 97 percent of participants could identify this malignancy. However, the video format preferences were not statistically significant 67.6 percent of the participants preferred the video format. Conclusion: These results suggest that this educational video is an effective and valuable method to enhance knowledge about skin health and improve identification of skin cancer among Spanish-speaking patients.