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Nearly half of recent immigrants to the United States lack health insurance. Access to cancer screening services for this group is problematic. We examine the role of health insurance and having a usual source of care (USC) on Pap smear and mammography utilization by immigrant women using a nationally representative sample.

We used a telephone survey that oversampled racial and ethnic minorities. We analyzed data on 3,622 women age 18–70. We classified the 822 foreign-born women as recent immigrants if they had resided in the United States for under 10 years; LT immigrants were those with a longer tenure.

Among recent immigrants, 73% and 78% (SE 4%) reported a Pap smear or mammogram, respectively, in the previous 2 years versus 89% and 89% of U.S.-born women (P < 0.05 for both comparisons). Among those with insurance or a USC, differences in screening …