Pink Fund is a national breast cancer non-profit organization that provides financial assistance to breast cancer patients beyond medical expenses. Breast cancer patients in active treatment often face financial toxicity. Financial toxicity is the debilitating—sometimes even life-threatening—financial side effects stemming directly from cancer treatment.

Pink Fund provides non-medical financial assistance and navigation, health literacy, and education to bridge the challenging gap for patients and their families between hardship and recovery. Research indicates nearly half of breast cancer patients face moderate-to-severe financial distress, which can affect everything from treatment choices and adherence to quality of life and mortality.

Pink Fund is one of a few breast cancer organizations that help with bills and expenses patients face that are not related to medical costs. Instead, funds are used to pay patient creditors directly for the basic cost of living bills.

Funds from Pink Fund are used to cover costs like housing, utilities, transportation, and insurance for up to 90 days. Patients in treatment for metastatic disease waiting for Social Security Disability benefits may be eligible for financial support for up to 180 days.

Pink Fund is one of the best breast cancer organizations to donate to if you want to help patients with the second aspect of the fight. Our mission is about supporting the basic needs of breast cancer patients during treatment so they can keep their focus on healing and surviving, not financial stress. While medical research is undeniably important, we do not fund research efforts.

All breast cancer donations go specifically to the patient’s critical expenses. Pink Fund is wholly transparent about finances and how donations are used. By 2022, the organization had delivered over $6 million in bill payments to support patients going through breast cancer treatment. To monitor how funds are used, Pink Fund makes all bill payments directly to patient creditors instead of granting funds to patients. For an overview of how Pink Fund helped patients, see our latest annual report.

When you donate to breast cancer in any way, you help provide critical funding that either directly or indirectly benefits those affected by this widespread disease.

Breast cancer is currently the second-leading cause of death for women in the United States.

Every year, 264,000 women and 2,400 men receive a breast cancer diagnosis and every year, approximately 42,000 women and 500 men lose their lives to breast cancer.

Whether you donate to support research, to a breast cancer fundraiser, or to organizations that support patients through treatment, your funds have tremendous value. You could change someone’s life directly while in treatment by improving adherence to treatment and their chance of survival. Or, your funds could support research efforts to change survivorship outcomes in the future.

Most people donate to cancer research or to help pay medical bills. After all, finding breast cancer organizations to donate to is not a difficult feat. There are many local breast cancer organizations and national organizations that accept donations and use that funding for these causes.

However, there are many ways to offer support outside of supporting research and paying medical expenses. Pink Fund focuses on non-medical bills because patients face many financial challenges through treatment and the financial toxicity aspects have largely gone underserved.

Chemotherapy sessions alone can last six months or longer. This doesn’t include other often-necessary treatments like surgery, radiation treatments or follow-up care, like aromatase inhibitors which can be prescribed for up to ten years.

Breast cancer treatments are often a great financial burden even for the insured. Yet, patients are also commonly left dealing with the financial fallout of reduced hours at work, long leaves of absence, and potentially lost employment altogether. In one study in 2020 of women who were diagnosed with breast cancer under the age of 40:

12.2% had to quit their jobs

7.5% lost their jobs

40.4% said their job performance suffered

47.3% had to take unpaid time off

Overall, 47 percent of the women surveyed in this study said they were in financial decline due to their diagnosis. The scary truth is, many Americans don’t have the money in savings to carry them through in the face of a health crisis like breast cancer. When you donate to organizations like Pink Fund, your funds go directly to helping patients that may otherwise be in financial crisis.

Even if you do not have money to offer someone going through breast cancer treatment, there are other ways you can show your support. Consider picking up their kids from school or activities or babysitting for the day if they have children. Sometimes, simple acts of kindness like delivering dinner, providing transportation to doctor’s appointments, or even offering to do some laundry can lighten the emotional load.

There are both national and local organizations that accept donations in support of people with breast cancer. If you search for “breast cancer donations near me,” you will find many local breast cancer organizations accepting donations. However, there are also organizations like Pink Fund that operate nationally to provide support for people all over the country.

While individual entities may have their requirements for donating, most will allow you to:

Donate money online

Mail a check to the organization

Pledge monthly donations

Offer a gift from your estate

Pledging a certain dollar amount can be a good way to donate to breast cancer and offer ongoing support. For example, by making a monthly pledge with Pink Fund for just $5 a month, you may be helping a patient cover their phone bill. Have $10 to $20 to give every month? This may be used to help cover utility bills for a family. A $100 pledge could help cover rent or mortgage and prevent a patient from losing their home. Even the smallest amounts can drastically impact helping a breast cancer patient.

All breast cancer donations go directly to the overseeing charity or organizations. Then, the organization decides how those funds are allocated or used unless you are donating to an entity that explicitly states that it collects funds for a specific effort or program. The best charities to donate to are those that are clear about how all funds are used to directly or indirectly help patients.

Donations are most often monetary. However, patients can have many other needs, especially during active treatment. It can be worth visiting a local cancer treatment center to find out what breast cancer patients may need that you could provide, such as:

Wigs or natural hair for making wigs

Specialty clothing

Blankets or comfort items to use during treatment

Lemonheads or hard candy to keep the mouth moist while in treatment

Books, magazines, and craft items to pass time during chemo sessions

The most impactful way to directly support an individual through breast cancer treatment is to help with their non-medical expenses like housing costs, transportation, utilities, or insurance. Patients often consider skipping or delaying life-saving treatment and returning to work when they can’t pay their car payment, mortgage, or rent. By donating to Pink Fund, your money will go directly to these non-medical bills.

Please note, Pink Fund is not able to accept non-monetary donations for breast cancer patients at this time.

Several organizations offer some level of financial assistance to patients in small amounts. For example, some organizations provide gift cards for gas and food.

Those that provide monetary assistance often deposit the funds directly into the patient’s bank account, which can be problematic for those who don’t have an account in good standing. While providing financial assistance by giving money directly to the patient may ease their burdens, there is no way to be certain how the funds are being spent. This is why Pink Fund pays creditors directly on behalf of patients to ensure financial accountability.

Both individuals and companies or corporations can partner with breast cancer non-profit organizations.

Individuals or sole proprietors often partner with breast cancer charities by offering pro bono services. For instance, an individual may offer:

Donate money online

Legal counsel or services

Accounting or bookkeeping services

Marketing services like video production or website optimization

Support during fundraising events

Companies or corporations often partner with breast cancer organizations to be good corporate citizens. They may volunteer corporate time or donate to an organization that aligns with their business model or an executive who has a personal connection to a particular cause.

Corporate/nonprofit partnerships are often legally binding agreements. For example, the corporation may commit in a contract to make minimum quarterly or annual donations.

In some cases, consumer products are involved. For instance, a brand may commit to donating a certain monetary amount to a non-profit per unit sold. These partnerships are most often disclosed to consumers to both raise awareness for the cause and enhance the sales volume of a particular supporting product. This is commonly referred to as “cause marketing”. Click here to set up a cause-marketing partnership with Pink Fund.

Always evaluate the organization before committing to a partnership by:

Examining the organization’s core mission

Checking out the nonprofit’s website

Securing a meeting with a member of the organization’s team

Spend time with the organization to get a feel for what they are about and how deeply they are committed to their mission. Make sure the organization’s mission resonates with you, but also make sure that mission is delivered effectively and efficiently.

A well-planned, well-fostered corporate/non-profit partnership can be a lasting relationship that provides support for breast cancer patients year after year. For example, Pink Funds has been partnered with the Ford Motor Company for 11 years and Snap-On Tools for 9. “We’ve maintained this partnership through ongoing partnership promotion on our website and social channels and by making ongoing communication key,” said Founder and CEO, Molly MacDonald.