Harman Patil (Editor)

Gilda's Club

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Gilda's Club httpsuploadwikimediaorgwikipediacommonsthu

Founded
  
1995, New York City, New York, United States

Headquarters
  
Hackensack, New Jersey, United States

Founders
  
Gilda Radner, Gene Wilder, Joel Siegel

Similar
  
National Coalition for Cance, Facing Our Risk of Cancer E, Corporate Angel Network, Young Survival Coalition, SHARE cancer support

Reaching out gilda s club metro detroit december 2012


Gilda's Club is a community organization for people living with cancer, their families and friends. Local chapters provide meeting places where those living with cancer, their families, and friends can join with others to build emotional and social support as a supplement to medical care. Free of charge and nonprofit, Gilda's Club chapters offer support and networking groups, lectures, workshops and social events in a nonresidential, homelike setting. The club was named in tribute to an original Saturday Night Live cast member Gilda Radner, who died of ovarian cancer in 1989. It is now known as the Cancer Support Community, except in Canada, where local branches retain the original name of Gilda's Club.

Contents

Cmntv interview with gilda s club metro detroit s executive director ceo laura varon brown


History

Gilda's Club was founded by Joanna Bull, Radner's cancer psychotherapist along with Radner's widower, Gene Wilder (himself a cancer survivor) and broadcaster Joel Siegel (who died after a long battle with the disease). The first club opened in New York City in 1995, after a long fundraising campaign that included movie trailers featuring Wilder in theaters around the country. The organization took its former name from Radner's comment that cancer gave her "membership to an elite club I'd rather not belong to". Radner's story can be read in her book, It's Always Something.

In July 2009, Gilda’s Club Worldwide merged with The Wellness Community, another established cancer support organization to create the Cancer Support Community (CSC). As of 2012, there were over 20 active local affiliates of Gilda’s Club. Although some local affiliates of Gilda’s Club and The Wellness Community have retained their names, many affiliates have adopted the name Cancer Support Community following the merger. The proposed name change caused controversy in some communities. The national organization introduced a web-based diagnostic "distress screening" tool which led the Pittsburgh Gilda's Club to change its name and sever its ties with the national organization because of a disagreement over requirements to offer the screening tool to all patients.

References

Gilda's Club Wikipedia