Background: Studies have demonstrated a relationship between segregation and level of education, occupational opportunities, and risk behaviors, yet a paucity of research has elucidated the association between racial residential segregation, socioeconomic deprivation, and lifetime cancer risk. Objectives: We examined estimated lifetime cancer risk from air toxics by racial composition, segregation, and deprivation in census tracts in Metropolitan Charleston. Methods: Segregation indices were used to measure the distribution of groups of people from different races within neighborhoods. The Townsend Index was used to measure economic deprivation in the study area. Poisson multivariate regressions were applied to assess the association of lifetime cancer risk with segregation indices and Townsend Index along with several sociodemographic measures. Results: Lifetime cancer risk from all pollution sources was 28 persons/million for half of the census tracts in Metropolitan Charleston. Isolation Index and Townsend Index both showed significant correlation with lifetime cancer risk from different sources. This significance still holds after adjusting for other sociodemographic measures in a Poisson regression, and these two indices have stronger effect on lifetime cancer risk compared to the effects of sociodemographic measures. Conclusions: We found that material deprivation, measured by the Townsend Index and segregation measured by the Isolation index, introduced high impact on lifetime cancer risk by air toxics at the census tract level.

According to the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Superfund is a federal government program implemented to clean up uncontrolled hazardous waste sites. Twenty-six sites in South Carolina (SC) have been included on the National Priorities List (NPL), which has serious human health and environmental implications. The purpose of this study was to assess spatial disparities in the distribution of Superfund sites in SC.

As guidelines for prostate cancer screening have changed from an annual screening recommendation starting at age 50 to discussing the benefits and harms of screening with health care providers, it is necessary to examine other types of factors that are important to prostate cancer screening decisions among African American men. Perceived risk of developing cancer has been shown to predict cancer control behaviors and is lower among African Americans. We characterized perceived risk of developing prostate cancer among African American men from November 2009 to 2011 and evaluated the relationship between prostate cancer risk perceptions and sociodemographic characteristics, health care experiences, and knowledge and exposure to health information about cancer. Chi square tests and logistic regression were employed to determine independent associations. Overall, men did not believe they were at increased risk of developing prostate cancer; they believed their risk was equivalent to or lower than men the same age. Perceived risk of prostate cancer was associated with income (OR = 0.59, 95% CI = 0.26, 1.34, p = 0.03), hypertension (OR = 2.68, 95% CI = 1.17, 6.16, p = 0.02), and beliefs about the association between race and cancer risk (OR = 2.54, 95% CI = 1.24, 5.20, p = 0.01). Clinic and community-based approaches to improve prostate cancer risk comprehension among African American men are needed to reduce the discordance between perceived risk and epidemiological data on prostate cancer risk factors. Risk education interventions that are developed for African American men may need to integrate information about susceptibility for multiple diseases as well as address strategies for risk reduction and prevention, and chronic disease management.