When you give to the American Cancer Society and the Coaches vs. Cancer program, you help us give more people more of their most precious commodity: time. With your help, we are saving lives and creating a world with more birthdays. We combine a century of experience in the fight against cancer with an incredible passion to see a world without the disease. We fight for everyone – and we get results. Here are a few ways we’re creating more birthdays in your community and across the nation:

Helping You Stay Well

• We help people quit smoking through our American Cancer Society Quitline® telephone counseling service. Since 2000, we have helped 400,000 tobacco users through confidential, one-on-one customized support.
• Our guidelines for proper nutrition and physical activity and cancer screenings help doctors and average Americans understand how to reduce cancer risk and what tests they need to find cancer at its earliest most treatable stage.
• We provide tips, tools, and online resources to help people set goals and stay motivated to eat healthy and maintain an active lifestyle.Helping You Get Well
• Our phone lines are open every minute of every day to help connect people with the answers they need. Each year, we provide free information and support to the nearly one million people who call us at 1-800-227-2345.
• We’re a trusted resource for the more than 23 million visitors each year to cancer.org, where we offer the latest information and news on cancer and help people locate resources in their community.
• Through our clinical trails matching service, we connect patients with more than 64,000 promising new treatments.
• Our online community for cancer survivors and caregivers has brought more than 93,000 people together for comfort and support since 2000.
• The American Cancer Society Hope Lodge® has helped more than 30,000 cancer patients and their families save tens of millions of dollars in lodging costs each year by providing a free place to stay and a community of support while they undergo treatment far from home.
• The American Cancer Society Patient Navigator Program, offered in 128 hospitals and treatment centers across America, helps guide people facing cancer through every step of their journey. In 2008, our navigators helped more than 45,000 patients through their cancer experience.

Finding Cures

• We’ve had a hand in nearly every major cancer breakthrough of the last century, including confirming the link between cigarette smoking and lung cancer, establishing the link between obesity and multiple cancers, developing drugs to treat leukemia and advanced breast cancer, and showing that mammography is the most effective way to detect breast cancer.
• We’re the largest non-governmental funder of cancer research in the United States, having spent more than $3.4 billion on cancer research since 1946.
• We spend approximately $130 million each year on cancer research.
• We fund beginning researchers with cutting-edge ideas early in their careers – 42 of whom have gone on to win the Nobel Prize, the highest accolade in scientific achievement.

Fighting Back

• Nearly 70 percent of the US population now covered by a smoke-free law can breathe easier, thanks in part to the Society and our nonprofit, nonpartisan advocacy affiliate, the American Cancer Society Cancer Action NetworkSM (ACS CAN).
• Together with ACS CAN, we have helped pass state laws ensuring that people have access to and coverage for lifesaving cancer screenings and treatments.
• We have helped more than 3 million uninsured, underinsured, and low-income women get breast and cervical cancer screening tests since 1991, and, along with ACS CAN, we have successfully fought for legislation protecting this care.
• One in every 100 Americans participates in one of the 5,000 American Cancer Society Relay For Life® events across the globe, comprising the world’s largest movement to end cancer.
• The American Cancer Society Making Strides Against Breast Cancer® event unites 500,000 walkers and more than 150 communities to help save lives from breast cancer and provide hope to people facing the disease.