Introduction
Cancer Council’s 13 11 20 confidential telephone information and support service routinely collects evaluation data. To best support a variety of users, examining differences in service access is essential.
Aim
This study investigated 13 11 20 service usage by South Australian males. Key questions were: How do patterns of service use differ in men, compared to women? What may explain these differences, revealing unmet information and support needs among men? How can these needs be met?
Method
Support service caller characteristics (2017/2018, SA) were examined for gender patterns in caller type, call reason, diagnosis, age, distress level and demographics. Follow-up calls were excluded (38.3%).
Results
Males represented 24.9% (n=1360) of callers (n=5459). Over half of male callers were aged over 65 years (54.7%), with 73.8% Australian born and 1.8% reporting as Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander. Average distress (0-10) for male callers was lower (M = 4.54, SD = 2.88, n=871) than for female callers asked (M = 5.36, SD = 2.89, n=2868) (Welch’s t =7.33, p<.001. Gender was associated with caller type. Of first-time callers, 41.5% were cancer patients, of whom 28.2% were male (p<.001). Of callers seeking psychological or emotional support (20.3%), a significantly lower proportion of male callers (21.9%) was observed relative to females (78.1%) (p<.01). This was also seen in screening related calls (9.6%), with significantly fewer male callers (31.2%) compared to females (68.8%) (p<.001). Male callers focussed on bowel (15.7%), prostate (14.0%) and lung (8.9%) cancer.
Conclusions
Males diagnosed with cancer have specific information and support needs that inform cancer support service preferences. As male callers may avoid seeking cancer supportive discussion, promoting adaptive coping strategies is important to effective treatment and recovery. Opportunity exists to enhance Cancer Council 13 11 20 information and support for males through service promotion and delivery strategies.