Board President Melissa Felder discusses the significance of Zero Breast Cancer in this month’s Get to Know the ZBC Board interview. She has been a member of the Board of Directors for the past three years and is toward the end of her first year of a two-year term as president. Building on her initial engagement with ZBC as a Taproot Foundation consultant, Melissa has helped ensure our organization fulfills our goals to prevent breast cancer in the next generation. She will help oversee exciting new developments that will be made possible by Marjorie Bonner’s generous bequest.

For the first interview of our new series, Get to Know ZBC Partners, we spoke with Helaine Alon, ZBC’s Communications Coordinator. Helaine started working with ZBC in October 2017. In her time with us, she has helped to overhaul the website, revitalize our social media pages, and write numerous book reviews and blog articles. We wish her well as she is moving on to new opportunities and are very grateful for the important work she has accomplished during her time with ZBC. 

GIS for Community Impact: From Technology to Translation

Scientists will continue research on groundbreaking discoveries by the pioneering Marin Women’s Study following a fundraising campaign that won a $77,000 Avon Foundation grant.

Heart Health & Breast Cancer 

Thursday, October 20, 2022

Breast and other cancer treatments can cause heart and artery diseases, which need to be identified and treated. Some may even be prevented. Watch the recording to hear from two cardiologists who work with people diagnosed with breast cancer and a panel of experts to learn about who is affected, common signs and symptoms, and how they are working to prevent and manage cancer-related cardiovascular diseases. 

Physical activity is one of the most beneficial things you can do for your health. It reduces the risk of many diseases, including breast cancer. It can also lead to better outcomes for people who have breast cancer and reduce the risk of reoccurrence for those who have recovered from the disease.

Did you know that you don’t have to drip sweat to see the benefits of exercise? For example, tai chi is a gentle exercise that shows similar benefits to more vigorous activities. It may improve the immune system, cardio-vascular fitness, strength, flexibility, balance, stress level and sleep.

Women who have had breast cancer are living longer than ever before. By eight years after a breast cancer diagnosis, people without metastatic disease are more likely to die from heart disease than breast cancer. Breast cancer treatment can increase the risk of some diseases of the heart, arteries and blood vessels, also known as cardiovascular diseases (CVD).

Two cardiologists (heart doctors) who work with cancer patients, a researcher and a breast cancer patient navigator joined Zero Breast Cancer’s October 2022 webinar to offer important information about managing heart health during and after breast cancer treatment. One of the panelists is also a breast cancer survivor. They gave an overview of the current treatments most likely to cause heart problems and what can be done to prevent or limit them.

A new study suggests eating fruits, vegetables and whole grains in adolescence could reduce breast cancer risk later in life. This maybe especially true for pre-menopausal cancer, which affects more women of color and is often more aggressive.

Not Too Late!

Even in early adulthood, for every additional 10g of fiber eaten (~ 1 apple & 2 slices whole wheat bread) there was a 13% drop in risk.

On Tuesday, February 12, 2013 the federally mandated Interagency Breast Cancer and Environmental Research Coordinating Committee (IBCERCC), released its report, Breast Cancer and the Environment: Prioritizing Prevention.

Breast cancer screening advice can be confusing. A new study in California aims to find a better way forward and is actively recruiting participants. Please consider how you can help. Visit thewisdomstudy.org to learn more.

Las mujeres que han tenido cáncer de mama viven más tiempo que nunca. A los ocho años después de un diagnóstico de cáncer de mama es más probable que las personas sin enfermedad metastásica mueran de una enfermedad del corazón que de cáncer de mama. El tratamiento del cáncer de mama puede aumentar el riesgo de algunas enfermedades del corazón, las arterias y los vasos sanguíneos, también conocidas como enfermedades cardiovasculares (ECV).

This blog is abstracted from an article in the Winter 2019 Pathways newsletter.

Have you heard the term Chemo Brain? Until the last decade, when women reported memory and thinking problems during or after being treated for breast cancer, they were often ignored. Now we know that cancer and cancer treatment can cause these changes and research is progressing on how to help people who have Chemo brain, also known as Cancer-related Cognitive Impairment (CRCI). We can take heart that most of us will recover our brain function and that there are things we can do to deal with memory/thinking problems.

When it comes to breast cancer, men — especially prime caregivers — are often a forgotten part of the equation.

A winner of a ZBC Honor Thy Healer: Healing Partner award, Woody Weingarten, has written a new book, "Rollercoaster: How a man can survive his partner's breast cancer," to remedy that situation. 

About the course

The Anticancer Lifestyle Program is a free online evidenced-based lifestyle transformation course that offers cancer survivors and those of us interested in prevention the tools and information we need to reduce the odds of cancer and cancer recurrence. It can also help prevent or manage other chronic illnesses, like heart disease and type II diabetes.

Several months ago, our colleagues at Breast Cancer Over Time (BCOT) asked us to help recruit for their study on the Impact of Chemical Exposure on the Human Breast. Like ZBC, BCOT focuses on preventing breast cancer in the next generation. They address the issue by championing and coordinating research into the environmental causes of breast cancer, while ZBC focuses on engaging communities in translating research into actionable steps that can reduce the risk of breast cancer. This study investigates the risks of chemicals in personal care products (PCPs), a topic ZBC actively addresses.

As complementary organizations, promoting BCOT’s study was an obvious decision. While sharing information about the study it, I also discovered that it was personally relevant to me. Read on to learn more about the study and my experience with it.

A new article published in the Journal of Clinical Oncology shows that breast cancer survivors who quit smoking after their diagnosis had a 33 percent lower risk of death as a result of breast cancer than those who continued to smoke.

“When Zero Breast Cancer (ZBC) was searching for a new executive director,” Rose Barlow recalls, “a recruiter sent me the posting with the words ‘This is perfect for you – and you would be perfect.’

The statistics are staggering, everyone knows of a person that has been touched by breast cancer and with all the advancements in medicine hopefully they survived. Karl Huie of Pacific Heights Cleaners climbed Mt. Shasta to create awareness for breast cancer as well as raise funds to support Zero Breast Cancer.

Genetics and Breast Cancer: Learnings From the Pathways Study and Clinical Practice

Thursday, April 25, 2024, 11 am PDT

Click here to register.

Do lifestyle and environment matter for genetic risk? How do genes impact breast cancer risk and treatment? How is genetic information used by physicians? Get these questions and more answered in our hour-long free webinar brought to you by Zero Breast Cancer and Kaiser Permanente Northern California Division of Research.