Cancer Support Community Los Angeles serves ALL persons impacted by cancer and their loved ones living across Los Angeles, Palm Springs, and the Coachella Valley. We believe wholeheartedly that community gives us a sense of belonging and it enables us to share personal relatedness and support each other’s wellness. Moreover, community is more than an alignment with a cancer diagnosis or geographic location; it is a feeling of fellowship with others. From our individual counseling, to support groups, healthy lifestyle classes, education workshops, and social events, to our Spanish and Child, Teen, and Family programs, we are committed to meeting the unique needs of our participants and their loved ones.
Our Commitment to Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion
Cancer Support Community Los Angeles is committed to ensuring that ALL patients and their families and loved ones have access to great quality cancer care, regardless of race, ethnicity, age, gender, or sexual orientation. In the spirit of this commitment to providing our critical cancer care services to all, CSCLA’s Healing Equitably through Action, Resilience, and Teamwork (HEART) is a conscious reorientation of our culture, ourselves, and our services towards marginalized and under-resourced communities, all of whom might have limited access to psychosocial support due to a dearth of services, lack of providers, historically entrenched health inequities, and stigma and discrimination. We recognize the resiliency that already exists throughout our diverse communities and respectfully endeavor to assist in strengthening those voices so that cancer resources and support are available. To this end, CSCLA actively collaborates with a network of partners to help us reach Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC), Latinx, Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI), Lesbian, Gay, Bi-Sexual, Transgender, Queer+ (LGBTQ+), seniors, children, and other underserved communities in Los Angeles and the Coachella Valley – and allow us to offer support groups specific to their cultural and ethnic needs.
“Sed” (Spanish pronunciation = Sehd). English translation is “thirst”.
Definition: A desire to possess. Usage: Students have a thirst for knowledge.
Cancer Support Community Los Angeles’ Cancer Equity and Diversity (CED) Committee was created to fulfill the thirst of community members striving for multidirectional inclusion. CSCLA invites inclusive conversations across lines of race, gender, religion, gender-identity, access to healthcare, and socioeconomic status to increase cross-difference understanding, inform a more equitable delivery of social and emotional care, and decrease the existing divide present in our diverse Los Angeles landscape. We strive to not only offer a seat at the table, but a voice in this important dialogue.
The CED Committee aims to promote inclusivity through learning, engaging, empowering, and uniting the vast and various communities of greater Los Angeles. As an organization, CSCLA commits to recognize and honor differences in race, gender identity, sexual orientation, ethnicity, nationality, socioeconomic status, language, (dis)ability, physical and emotional health, age, religious commitment, political perspective, and individuals and communities that have and continue to be underrepresented and often marginalized. CSCLA maintains that knowledge and understanding of different cultural norms and demographics are critical in establishing community trust and we aim to deliver equitable access to supportive care across lines of immigration status, intergenerational status, and limited English proficiency (LEP).
Cancer Support Community Los Angeles staff and Board of Directors are committed to our patients, community stakeholders, hospital partners, and medical organizations to:
- Embed health equity and racial justice into our Diversity, Equity, and Inclusivity (DEI) strategy and proactively address racism at all levels of our interpersonal and institutional culture
- Rely on data and utilize data to appraise our internal approach to program development, staffing, and community partnerships to unveil systems that perpetuate inequities in our diverse Los Angeles territory, including BIPOC, Latinx, AANHPI, LGBTQIA+, and other disadvantaged and historically marginalized groups.
- Take responsibility and engage in inclusive conversations and actions to be informed, self-reflective, and active in promoting justice and change.
- Design our programs, educational programming, internal trainings, and services to include dimensions of diversity, cultural sensitivity, and inclusivity.
- Actively manage change in meaningful discussions to address systemic racism through organizational strategy, engagement with community partners, hospitals and community-based medical organizations, and our 40+ year mission as the premiere provider of social and emotional support for cancer patients.
- Continuously extend our cancer equity and diversity efforts and be held accountable for our actions.
CSCLA is an Equal Opportunity Employer.
CSCLA Cancer Equity and Diversity Committee Members
Indigenous Land Acknowledgement
The Cancer Support Community Los Angeles acknowledges the sacred indigenous lands belonging to the Tongva (Gabrieleno) and Chumash Nations upon which our office sits. Additionally, we acknowledge the Native people displaced throughout Los Angeles: our organization enacts its work, not only at 1990 Bundy, but throughout Los Angeles County and beyond. As an organization dedicated to healing, we honor the Native people and reflect upon our role in an often devastating history of oppression enacted upon diverse populations of Native people in Los Angeles and throughout our country.
You can also learn more about the Native land you occupy here: native-land.ca/
