Current Grant Recipients

Thank you for your interest in learning more about our current grant recipients. Please remember there are two types of grants, large Community Grants (applications are accepted once a year) as well as Small Grants that are available year round.

Current Small Grantees for 2012-2013:

1. C. Wright Pink Ribbon Project

Provides financial assistance (assistance with bills) to current breast cancer patients. For more information, call Catherine Wright at (318) 453-3544.

2. Pink Passionate Day at DeSoto Regional Hospital

August 31, 2012-Rescheduled due to weather: September 7, 2012:  Honoring and celebrating breast cancer patients and survivors from DRHS at a luncheon at Southside Baptist Church in Mansfield, LA.

For more information, contact Sharon Procell at sharonprocell@desotoregional.com

3. Feist-Weiller Cancer Center/LSUHSC-Shreveport:  Breast Cancer Survivor Breakfast

Saturday, October 13, 2012 Honoring and celebrating breast cancer survivors at a breakfast at Lake Bethlehem Baptist Church in Shreveport, LA.

For more information, contact Yolanda Duckworth at yduckw@lsuhsc.edu

4. Feist-Weiller Cancer Center/LSUHSC-Shreveport:  Monthly Breast Cancer Support Group

Meets on the last Monday of the month at Lake Bethlehem Baptist Church in Shreveport, LA.

For more information, contact:  Yolanda Duckworth  yduckw@lsuhsc.edu

5. Breasts, Blossoms & Butterflies:  CHRISTUS Schumpert Breast Care Center

Publication of this book to help newly diagnosed breast cancer patients understand what is happening before, during and after surgery and treatment and to help them bloom again.  Written by breast cancer survivor and registered nurse, Brenda Pierce.

To obtain a copy or for more information, contact Brenda Pierce at brenda.pierce@christushealth.org

6. Feist-Weiller Cancer Center/LSUHSC-Shreveport:  Gas Transportation Cards

Gas cards to assist qualified breast cancer patients to treatment at FWCC.

For more information, contact Anne Higdon at ahigdo@lsuhsc.edu

7. CHRISTUS Schumpert:  Breast Cancer Monthly Support Group Meetings

Meets on the fourth Thursday of the month from 5:30-6:30pm at The Breast Center 902 Olive Street.  You do not have to be a Schumpert patient to attend.  All Survivors are welcome!  For more information, contact Denise Tindell at 318-453-7674.

List of Current Community Grant Recipients

Our Community grant projects have been selected by our independent Grant Review Panel as those that will have the greatest impact in serving uninsured or underinsured women in our service area. Please note that Susan G. Komen for the Cure® is not a direct service provider.

Project Title:        Women’s Health Program
Organization:       Martin Luther King Health Center
Amount:              $80,982
Parishes served:   Caddo, Bossier, DeSoto, Bienville, Claiborne, Natchitoches, Webster
•This grant funds a program to promote and coordinate breast cancer education, early detection, and screening services for medically disenfranchised women in  northwest Louisiana.  The breadth of the program is to act as a partner with community gatekeepers to reduce the risk, morbidity, mortality and economic impact of breast cancer on residents and to ultimately eradicate breast cancer as a life threatening disease.  The program employs two community health advocates who provide outreach in both English and Spanish and utilize a unique array of outreach techniques to extend services to as many women as possible.  MLKHC has also established collaborative partnerships to increase the scope of the program to rural areas.

Project Title:        Partners In Wellness
Organization:       LSU Health Sciences Center-Shreveport/Feist-Weiller Cancer Center
Amount:              $112,422
Parishes served:  Caddo, Bossier, Natchitoches, Sabine, Webster, Bienville
•This grant funds free cancer screening mammograms for women ages 40-49 who otherwise would not be able to afford them.  PIW offers free screening clinics on the LSUHSC campus five days a week and mobile mammography in the mobile mammography van three days a week for patients unable to travel to Shreveport.  The target population is the medically underserved and minorities of northwest Louisiana.  Susan G. Komen for the Cure fills a gap for breast cancer screening mammograms that are not funded by any other source.  Another program pays for the mammograms of women ages 50-64 who qualify.  This grant greatly impacts the women of northwest Louisiana.  The sooner they begin screenings and are educated on the benefits of screenings, their chance of survival greatly increases.

Project Title:        Rural Mammography Screening and Education
Organization:       CHRISTUS Coushatta Health Care Center/CHRISTUS Cabrini Foundation
Amount:             $66,806
Parishes served:  Red River, Natchitoches, DeSoto, Bienville•This grant will provide screening vouchers with accompanying breast health awareness to a rural and underserved population.  Key activities include initial and diagnostic mammogram screening vouchers, breast cancer education and Komen awareness.  The program’s primary goal is to reduce early breast cancer death in African American and rural populations through increased outreach of breast health education and breast cancer prevention services to underserved areas.  An awareness program will be conducted to alert community members to the vouchers as well as educate them in breast health and the activities of Susan G. Komen for the Cure.

Project Title:      DRHS Breast Health Outreach
Organization:     DeSoto Regional Health System
Amount:            $9,790

Parishes served: DeSoto, Sabine, Red River, Natchitoches
•This program is designed to bring education, advocacy, and breast screening services to medically underserved women in DeSoto Parish and other communities in Northwest Louisiana.  The program provides women with the resources needed to increase their knowledge of and access to breast health care, screening and options of care available to them in this area.  Efforts will include educational programs at community locations, hospital functions, health fairs and offering free clinical breast screenings to qualifying persons in the service areas.  The population to be served will include the rural, medically underserved women age 30 and above, but will also include women of all ages, races and income levels depending upon the educational outreach setting.  Finding just one treatable breast cancer in one woman who might otherwise have gone undetected is a huge success for us at DRHS.