15 Year Breast Cancer Grant Recipient
April 8th, 2011
Baton Rouge, LA (April 5, 2011) – The Baton Rouge Affiliate of Susan G. Komen for the Cure® today announced its largest grant slate in the Affiliate’s 15 year history. Grants totaling more than $545,000 have been offered to area health organizations for 11 breast cancer-related programs.
“Thanks to overwhelming region-wide support, we are thrilled to offer this record level of grant funded programs to women and men in our local area,” Lucie Agosta, PhD, RNC and President of the Komen Baton Rouge Affiliate Board of Directors. “Our mission is to end breast cancer forever by empowering people, ensuring quality care for all, and energizing sciences to find the cure,” she added.
Donations from the 15th Anniversary Komen Baton Rouge Race for the Cure®, Bowl for the Cure®, and from individual and business donors across the area made this record mission funding possible. Contributions from the 2011 Race alone totaled $552,000.
In addition to funding local breast cancer programs, the Affiliate will also contribute more than $125,000 this year to the Komen National Research Grant Program.
The programs receiving Affiliate funding will conduct breast cancer education, screening, mammography and treatment in the 10-parish Greater Baton Rouge area, including Ascension, East Baton Rouge, West Baton Rouge, East Feliciana, West Feliciana, Iberville, Livingston Parish, Pointe Coupee, St. Helena, and Tangipahoa Parishes.
The Affiliate’s fiscal year 2012 (April 1, 2011 – March 31, 2012) grant slate is as follows:
American Cancer Society – Resource Network
Cancer Services of Greater Baton Rouge – Exercise Program for Survivor
- Health Care Navigation
- Financial Assistance
Mary Bird Perkins Cancer Center – Comprehensive Early Detection – Mobile Screening
North Oaks Health System – Screening for Women in Tangipahoa & St. Helena parishes
Ochsner Health Systems – Hope Check Breast Cancer Support Group
POINTE COUPEE HOMEBOUND
HEALTH & HOSPICE -Awareness, Screening, Mammography
River Region Cancer Screening Center – Education, Screening, Mammography
Woman’s Hospital – Digital Mobile Mammography
YWCA Greater BR ENCOREplus – Breast Health Empowerment
“We are especially happy to offer the Greater Baton Rouge area this host of breast cancer services. Grant applications were carefully reviewed and receipients ranked to be sure we are funding the best and most effective programs available in our region,” said outgoing Grants Chair Barbara Scwartzenburg, a survivor who has worked with the Affiliate’s grant program for six years.
Over the years, the Affiliate’s grant programs have funded tens of thousands of education sessions, and provided thousands of clinical screenings, mammograms, treatment support, and financial assistance for underserved local women. Additionally, the grants provided exercise and support groups for breast cancer survivors.
The Komen Baton Rouge Affiliate’s grant program is a part of Susan G. Komen for the Cure’s national breast cancer support efforts. In 2010 alone, because of the Organization’s global outreach program, the following services were made available to breast cancer survivors and underserved women in particular:
2.2 million Breast cancer education/awareness information provided
295,000 Clinic breast exams performed
351,000 Mammograms performed
48,000 Psychosocial services provided
40,000 Financial aid services provided
In addition, the Organization funded more than $610 million in the organization’s 30-year history, including several Nobel Prize winning discoveries. Today, these research efforts are focused on preventing breast cancer, understanding why breast cancer spreads within the body, understand why some people (such as African American women) have higher rates of breast cancer, refining treatment options, and more.
Since 1990, there has been a 31% decline in breast cancer mortality with 2.5 million survivors in the United States alone; yet, 40,000 women and 1900 men will die of breast cancer annually in the United States. Louisiana is in the top two ranking for breast cancer deaths with more African American women diagnosed with late state breast cancer than women of other ethnicies.
About Susan G. Komen for the Cure® and the Komen Baton Rouge Affiliate
Nancy G. Brinker promised her dying sister, Susan G. Komen, she would do everything in her power to end breast cancer forever. In 1982, that promise became Susan G. Komen for the Cure and launched the global breast cancer movement. The Baton Rouge Affiliate of Susan G. Komen for the Cure is working to better the lives of those facing breast cancer in the local community joining more than 2.5 million breast cancer survivors and activists around the globe as part of the world’s largest and most progressive grassroots network fighting breast cancer. Through events like the Komen Baton Rouge Race for the Cure®, the Baton Rouge Affiliate has invested hundreds of thousands of dollars in community breast health programs in our ten-parish service area. Up to 75 percent of net proceeds generated by the Affiliate stay in the Greater Baton Rouge area. The remaining income goes to the national Susan G. Komen for the Cure Grants Program to fund research. For more information, call (225) 615-8740 or visit www.komenbatonrouge.org
