Cancer Support Community San Francisco Bay Area

Cancer Support Community aims to help cancer patients achieve their best possible medical outcomes and to enjoy their highest possible quality of life while facing cancer. We provide education, psychosocial services, mind-body wellness, and other programs that complement high quality medical care to help patients live longer, to help survivors have less recurrence and greater resiliency, and to help families and caregivers cope with the great stresses and challenges that cancer creates. We aim to help anyone affected by cancer in the nine counties of the San Francisco Bay Area.

We provide a broad range of psychosocial services entirely free of charge, to anyone affected by cancer, at any stage in their cancer journey, for as long as those services are needed. Our programs, which focus on improving stress management, getting social support, and making behavioral changes in diet and activity, include
• Weekly support groups and cancer-specific networking groups for patients and caregivers;
• Mind-body wellness classes such as Restorative Yoga, Pilates, Tai Chi Chih, Kundalini Yoga, Moving for Life, and Mindfulness;
• Nutrition and cooking workshops such as Eating for Healing, Nutrition & Cancer Treatment, and Fundamentals of Nutrition;
• Education, skill building, and creative expression such as Kids Circle & Teen Talk, The Healing Power of Writing, Couples and Cancer, Urban Zen, Essential Oils & Emotions, Compassionate Communication, Financial and Estate Planning, and many more.
In addition, all our programs and workshops are structured to create a deep, rich sense of community. Our members don't just learn from instructors and therapists; they get empowerment and a profound sense of belonging from helping each other and being part of a community who understand each other.

Since 1990 Cancer Support Community has been a second family to cancer patients, survivors, caregivers, and their family members—a community where anyone facing cancer can get education, individual and group counseling, and mind-body wellness support in a caring, compassionate, welcoming environment—all entirely free for as long as they need it. Our expert instructors and licensed therapists provide the highest possible level of compassionate care.

The kind of psychosocial care that that CSC provides has been shown to improve medical outcomes, increase life expectancy, and reduce cancer recurrence. When coupled with good medical care, patients who receive this type of comprehensive psychosocial support are:
• 56% less likely to die
• 45% less likely to have recurrence
• 59% less likely to die if they have recurrence
• Able to live an average of 18 months longer if they have recurrence

Those receiving psychosocial care also improve their health and quality of life:
• Reduced anxiety by 77%
• Improved immune response by 144%
• Improved physical functioning by 276%
• Reduced physical symptoms by 43%
• Increased positive dietary changes by 117%

In 2020 we began offering all our programs and services virtually through secure video conferencing, which allows us to expand our geographic reach as well as connect with cancer patients who cannot make it to one of our two physical centers.

In 2017, we served more than 2,000 people. In 2018 and 2019, we helped more than 2,200 people. In 2020 we opened a second office in East Contra Costa County, an area disproportionately affected by cancer, with few available services. Also in 2020, we began offering all our programs and services virtually through secure video conferencing, so people affected by the COVID-19 pandemic could continue to get critical education, support, and connection during an especially isolating and troubling time.

Most people come to us on referral from their oncologist or nurses, or from friends who know of the good work we do, and we expect this growth to continue over the next several years as more people learn about us. For more than a decade, we have achieved our outcome goals as measured by our key indicators, and from the beginning we have provided all these services entirely free of charge--all paid for through donations and charitable gifts.

At the end of 2018, we were gifted six acres of beautiful, undeveloped land in Lafayette, California, right in the heart of the East Bay just minutes from Oakland and Walnut Creek, very near public transit and key highways. We plan to build a brand new, state of the art healing community center surrounded by the natural splendor of this unique, six acre site. Our center will have specially designed program space including an indoor/outdoor movement studio, dedicated creative arts space, areas designed for group and individual counseling, and even dedicated space for our children's and family programs. We will have meditative walking trails through the undisturbed natural landscape, and we will create a healing garden where our members will grow cancer-fighting plants for our nutrition classes. This vision is taking shape in 2021 as we pursue building permits and raise funds through our ongoing capital campaign.