Cancer Support Community Central New Jersey

It is our goal to:

1. Double our reach into the community we serve
2. Expand our reach into underserved communities
3. Reach patients earlier in the cancer continuum in order to provide them with distress screenings and treatment decision support tools, thereby helping to improve their outcomes

To address the significant need in the community, the Board’s Strategic Planning Committee, in conjunction with Crossroads4Hope leadership, has developed innovative strategies designed to unleash programmatic and systemic change, position Crossroads4Hope as a leading voice for all cancer patients, family members and caregivers, and enable us to offer services to more people over a wider geography. The culmination of this work has been the creation of well-rounded business plans to actualize our strategies.
We have taken a “whole-community” approach to address significant unmet psychosocial needs for people affected by cancer, while creating multiple, relevant points-of-entry to our organization. These strategies are both individual approaches as well as components of an integrated ecosystem that will support and accelerate our growth. The following strategies comprise our Vision for the Future: Support4Families ,Nutrition, Outreach to Diverse Communities, Unmet Needs, and Patient Centered Care . For more information, and to learn the details of these strategies, please reach out to Crossroads4Hope at (908) 658-5400.

Crossroads4Hope, formerly known as Cancer Support Community Central New Jersey, is a network of cancer support that is a registered 501(c)(3) organization. As experts in oncology mental health, the organization provides support, education, and hope to all people with cancer and their loved ones. Backed by evidence that the best cancer care includes social and emotional support, Crossroads4Hope creates a caring community to help individuals live with, through, and beyond cancer. At no charge to people with cancer, family members, and caregivers, the organization delivers essential programs and services including individual and group support; educational, nutrition, and healthy-cooking workshops; classes to enhance health and wellness; and activities that build social connections. Crossroads4Hope has temporarily moved its program of support to a virtual platform since the start of stay-at-home orders, and will continue to provide both virtual and in-person support in the future.

Since 2004, Crossroads4Hope has provided services at no charge to more than 15,000 people who have sought our services, and has delivered more than 100,000 hours of programming.

With Crossroads4Hope, individuals affected by cancer are given an opportunity to enhance their health and well-being and build strong social connections through participation in professionally-led programs including: individual and group support; educational workshops; healthy cooking and nutrition programs; and health and wellness classes. Our work is evidence-based and all programs and services are always free of charge.

Crossroads4Hope Board of Trustees, community stakeholders, and staff work closely together to create a vision for our organization including doubling the reach of our services, at a minimum, with a particular focus on underserved communities as well as the people typically forgotten in the cancer journey: family members, caregivers and, most notably, children.

Over the last few years, and in earnest since 2013, we have been creating innovative strategies to improve the cancer experience. Our strategies focus on providing evidence-based, professionally-led programs that will always remain free of charge to patients, families, and caregivers. These strategies are designed to unleash programmatic and systemic change, and will position Crossroads4Hope as a leading voice for cancer patients and their families, enabling us to offer services to more people over a wider geography.

Crossroads4Hope is investing in and integrating the disciplines of Social Work, Child Life, and Public Health across all of these strategies to create a more significant impact in the community psychosocial oncology health space and, more specifically, the lives of the individuals who are affected by cancer. When a family member is diagnosed with cancer, especially with the underlying anxiety of a global pandemic from a novel disease, the best treatment approach is multidisciplinary. By elevating an interdisciplinary team of Social Work, Public Health, and Child Life to serve the psychosocial needs of the cancer-stricken community, we are able to provide improved social and emotional support. This team approach allows our staff to work at the top of their licenses, and offer the widest range of help and resources to support our participants.