$10 million toward access
Helping everyone gain access to the vaccinations and screening services they need to prevent cancer or detect it early, when successful treatment is more likely.
While innovation in cancer screening is improving early detection and finding cancer in earlier stages, people who live in medically underserved areas in the U.S. and in other countries still lack access due to financial, logistical and cultural obstacles. Reaching these populations with programs tailored to addressing barriers and meeting their medical needs with culturally appropriate solutions is crucial to increasing early detection.
The Prevent Cancer Foundation is committed to connecting the most vulnerable populations with the most current cancer prevention knowledge and early detection technology available. We do this by meeting people where they are: in their schools, in their communities and around the world, and providing the knowledge and tools they may lack.
Our community grants program is bringing cancer prevention education and proven screening methods and technology—including mammograms, cervical and colorectal cancer screenings and low-dose CT lung-cancer screenings—to at-risk, medically underserved communities across the U.S. and around the world.
“This project in Mozambique is one of the most rewarding of my career. We have an amazing collaborative team of doctors, nurses and researchers from Mozambique, Brazil and the U.S. Together we are working to significantly decrease deaths from cervical cancer by teaching local nurses and doctors to perform the necessary procedures for cervical cancer prevention and treatment.”
—Dr. Kathleen Schmeler, MD Anderson Cancer Center, recipient of Prevent Cancer Foundation funding to conduct cervical cancer screening and prevention in Mozambique, which has one of the highest rates of cervical cancer in the world.
Spotlight: Improving access
Increasing Colorectal and Cervical Cancer Screening Rates Among the Homeless
On any given night in Baltimore, Md., nearly 3,000 people experience homelessness. People experiencing homelessness have a higher cancer risk, and due to lack of access to health care, often do not have a diagnosis until advanced stages.
Healthcare for the Homeless partners with caregivers, advocates and donors to provide comprehensive health care and support services to people experiencing homelessness.
A community grant from the Prevent Cancer Foundation has enabled improved access to colorectal and cervical cancer education and screening for the thousands of people without homes in Baltimore. Education and screening are now part of standard care at clinic sites and screening kits are readily available. These simple strategies, combined with targeted outreach calls to people due for a screening, have increased the rates of both cervical and colorectal cancer screening over the last year, helping dozens to detect cancer early and increase the odds of a successful outcome.
In 2018, Healthcare for the Homeless screened 50% of its eligible clients—a 36% improvement from 2016.
