Heart of the Community: Rochdale Breast Awareness Outreach

For Ethnic Minority Cancer Awareness Month, our breast awareness outreach in Rochdale reached more than 500 women, helping break down barriers to breast screening and early detection.

Rochdale is home to ethnically diverse communities and has significantly lower breast screening uptake than the national average. With breast screening taking place locally, our visit provided an opportunity to reach women who may face additional barriers to accessing information and healthcare services.

We took our Community Breast Awareness Café to the Witely Road Wellbeing Hub, bringing our breast cancer outreach and conversations about breast screening, prevention and early detection directly into the community.

Over three days, our Health Inclusion Team spoke to more than 500 women about breast awareness, the signs and symptoms of breast cancer and the importance of attending breast screening. We had conversations in English and Urdu, while providing information and resources in Arabic and Bengali.

Working alongside people and organisations who know the community was central to making the outreach successful. Through our relationship with Rochdale Council’s Public Health team, we identified a venue that local women already knew and trusted. We were also joined by the Cancer Screening Improvement Lead from Bolton NHS Foundation Trust, who provided locally relevant information about breast screening and heard directly from women about the barriers they face.

Our Awareness Café provided a welcoming space for open, honest conversations about breast awareness, with free hot drinks, healthy snacks and demonstrations using our breast mannequin to show women how to check for changes. Together we created a warm, inclusive hub where women felt comfortable asking questions, learning and connecting with one another.

Health Inclusion volunteers joined our breast awareness outreach across all three days, providing invaluable support and insight. One of our volunteers is a family history nurse at the Nightingale Centre, who was able to provide medical advice to members of the community in a relaxed, non-clinical setting.

Nighat Ahmed, one of our Health Inclusion and Community Engagement volunteers, had conversations with women in English, Urdu and Punjabi, which she said helped build connection and conversation with South Asian women. When asked about her experience volunteering with us, Nighat said:

I was taken aback by just how many had had breast cancer or were going through it. I had a good feeling knowing I may have brought about something that some ladies didn’t know about. It was a gratifying and in some ways a humbling experience.

Our Health Inclusion volunteers’ language skills, professional experience and understanding of local communities helped us connect with women who might otherwise have been less likely to engage.

Our breast awareness outreach continued at Madina Masjid, partnering with the local mosque to deliver a breast awareness session in Urdu. Around 35 women attended, where we discussed self-checking, screening, and early detection. We aimed to create an inclusive space in a familiar setting, where women could ask questions and learn about being breast aware.

After the session, a woman told us that she had booked a breast screening appointment after ignoring invitations for years. This is a strong example of how culturally tailored engagement can break down barriers to participation.

Dr Bareera Asad, an Urdu-speaking GP from The Kingsway Practice, volunteered her time to join the session. Having a trusted healthcare professional available to answer questions in a familiar language and private setting was greatly valued by attendees. Reflecting on the session and our wider community outreach activity in Rochdale, Dr Bareera said:

As a GP, we are in a privileged position in supporting people with their health and as a Muslim, I feel empowered to help support women and girls from our community to engage with healthcare. It was so inspiring and insightful to have our community engage with these projects and contribute their stories.

The success of our breast awareness outreach was made possible by partnering with local organisations already embedded in the community.

PossAbilities, a day centre for disabled adults, generously hosted our Community Awareness Café in their car park, providing an accessible location for our breast awareness outreach.

The Kingsway Practice, which shares the site with PossAbilities, texted their patients to encourage them to visit the Awareness Café and speak to the Health Inclusion Team with any questions about breast health. Many women came along as a direct result of the practice’s text message.

One woman who visited the Awareness Café had recently been called back following a mammogram and was understandably anxious. Over a coffee, we talked through what to expect, the support available and her concerns about what might lie ahead. She left feeling more reassured, and we were grateful to be able to support her at such a difficult time.

The staff at The Kingsway Practice also visited the Awareness Café. We shared multilingual resources which they could share with their patients and discussed the importance of outreach and tailored interventions grounded in community need.

Across our three days of outreach, we had many impactful conversations with women from a wide range of backgrounds.

Many women told us that although they understood the importance of checking their breasts, no one had ever shown them how to do it properly. After watching a demonstration on the breast mannequin, they left  with greater confidence in knowing what changes to look and feel for.

Importantly, many wanted to pass this knowledge to their daughters and other family members, helping breast awareness conversations continue beyond the Awareness Café.

Other women told us they had been avoiding attending their breast screening appointment as they were afraid of the results. Hearing from a woman who had gone through breast cancer helped them understand the importance of attending screening.

These conversations demonstrate why taking health messaging directly into under-served communities is so important. It also showed the value of creating spaces where people can learn from and support one another.

Our time in Rochdale reinforced the importance of tailoring outreach to the needs of diverse communities and working closely with local organisations who understand them best. It was a successful week of community engagement, giving us the opportunity to connect with hundreds of women from under-served communities and share potentially lifesaving breast awareness and early detection messages directly with the women who need it most.

Our breast awareness outreach demonstrated the power of partnership to improve the health of our local communities, and we would like to extend our thanks to all those involved, including those who visited our Awareness Café and attended the session at Madina Masjid. Thank you to David Wilson Homes for kindly sponsoring our three days of outreach.