About Us
Community Is Stronger Than Cancer
Our Story
40 years ago, our founders transformed the way our culture faces cancer. Today we are a global community of 175 locations providing personalized cancer support, all free of charge.
Our Mission
As the largest professionally led nonprofit network of cancer support worldwide, the Cancer Support Community is dedicated to ensuring that all people impacted by cancer are empowered by knowledge, strengthened by action, and sustained by community.
Our Belief That Community Is Stronger Than Cancer
We are a relentless ally for anyone who is striving to manage the realities of this disruptive disease and get back to normal.
No one can, or should, face cancer alone.
While we have witnessed many significant advances in treating this devastating disease, nothing takes the place of the power, inspiration, companionship, and connection that comes from community.
We are here to provide relevant and highly personalized support when and where it is needed most because Community is Stronger than Cancer.
Our Global Network in Action
We are a global non-profit network of 175 locations, including CSC and Gilda's Club centers, hospital and clinic partnerships, and satellite locations that deliver more than $50 million in free support and navigation services to patients and families. Find a location near you.
In addition, we administer a toll-free helpline, 888-793-9355, and produce award-winning educational and digital resources that, together with the locations, reach more than one million people each year.
We also conduct cutting-edge research on the emotional, psychological, and financial journey of cancer patients and advocate at all levels of government for policies to help individuals whose lives have been disrupted by cancer.
Our Support of Inclusion and Equity for All
We believe in equity for all, including in health care, and fight every day to ensure that all people are treated with dignity and respect and have the opportunity to live healthy and safe lives — physically, mentally, and emotionally.
We commit to listen, educate ourselves, and stand in solidarity with communities of color in these challenging times. We will create and maintain a climate of inclusion. We will hold our leaders, policymakers, and those in positions of power accountable with the expectation and conviction that these measures will end the inequalities we struggle with today and ensure that the opportunity to lead healthy and safe lives is within reach for all of us.
Our History and Growth
Our global network traces its roots to a yellow house in Santa Monica, California, where Harriet and Dr. Harold Benjamin transformed the way our culture faces cancer.
After Harriet’s diagnosis with cancer in 1972, Dr. Benjamin sought to create a community that would provide social and emotional support to cancer patients and their families and friends — all free of charge.
In 1982, The Wellness Community opened its doors in Santa Monica, California.
Gilda Radner, the late comedian and original “Saturday Night Live” benefited from The Wellness Community after being diagnosed with ovarian cancer in 1986. Her experience inspired her to call for similar support-focused organizations.
Although Radner passed away in 1989, her husband, Gene Wilder, and Joanna Bull, along with other friends and family, answered her call to action. Together, they founded Gilda’s Club New York City and opened its iconic Red Door in 1995.
In 2007, the Institute of Medicine released Cancer Care for the Whole Patient: Meeting Psychosocial Health Needs, emphasizing the importance of addressing the social and emotional needs of individuals facing cancer, rather than just their physical needs.
The report underscored what The Wellness Community and Gilda’s Club Worldwide, and its affiliate networks, had been doing for many years and sparked merger discussions between the two organizations to increase efficiencies and serve even more patients.
In 2009, The Wellness Community and Gilda’s Club Worldwide became one organization: Cancer Support Community.
In 2018, we welcomed the Denver-based nonprofit MyLifeLine.org, a digital community that includes thousands of patients, caregivers, and their supporters. The addition of MyLifeLine has enabled us to expand services in innovative, groundbreaking ways.
CSC Counters COVID-19
CSC is proud to share this Impact Index that documents how our community stepped forward to ensure our resources were able to reach individuals in need.
Are you interested in collaborating with CSC?
If you have an idea that aligns with CSC's mission and can help cancer patients or their loved ones, we want to hear from you.
Patient Planning Services
Founded in 2013, Patient Planning Services (PPS) is the social enterprise for the Cancer Support Community. PPS works with patients, health care providers, and community organizations to provide distress screening and other assessments on a digital platform that allows for both dynamic and static resource allocation in real time and triage of high-acuity patients while meeting accreditation standards.
Backed by research in digital distress screening, the proprietary measures PPS provides not only score distress but also combine resources and provide risk subscales to help providers react and create action around the distress scoring.
On Shelves Now
From CSC's former Executive Chair Kim Thiboldeaux, Your Cancer Road Map is a new, comprehensive guidebook for cancer patients, their families, and caregivers.
Meet Our Leadership Team
Careers
Cancer Support Community is an Equal Opportunity Employer and offers positions with varying levels of responsibility for the development and support of our mission.
