LACK OF COLON-CANCER COVERAGE IN 7 WOMENS MAGAZINES

Women's magazines are an important source of health information. To ev aluate the relevancy of articles in these publications to known diseas e risks, seven women's magazines were reviewed to assess their coverag e of colon cancer, the third leading cause of cancer mortality in U.S. women. Specifically, the amount of coverage devoted to colon cancer a s well as the presentation of issues in the prevention, risks, treatme nt, diagnosis and genetics of colon cancer were recorded. Twenty artic les were published on colon cancer in these magazines during the years 1987-1995. Compared to five other cancers that also affect women, col on cancer was the focus of the fewest articles in the seven magazines analyzed.