The Wellness Community Kicks Off New Support Group With a Seminar on Advances in Lung Cancer Treatment

The Wellness Community Valley/Ventura kicks off a new lung cancer networking group with a free educational seminar led by a UCLA lung cancer physician. “Progress in the Management of Lung Cancer” presented by Edward Garon, MD, takes place on Tuesday, June 21 from 6:30 p.m. until 8:00 p.m. at 530 Hampshire Road, Westlake Village, CA 91361. The seminar and networking group are open to lung cancer patients, survivors and family members. The lung cancer networking group meets on the first and third Tuesday of each month at 6:30pm, beginning July 5, at the same address as the seminar. Psychotherapist Peggy Johnston, MFT will facilitate. Johnston has been a cancer support group facilitator at The Wellness Community for 11 years. The seminar and the group are both free, but registration is required. Call (805) 379-4777 to register or learn more.

In April, for the first time in four decades, the National Cancer Institute reported a decline in lung cancer deaths for women. The lung cancer death rate for men began to decrease in the early 1990s. In the seminar Dr. Garon will discuss additional encouraging trends in treatment, clinical trials, and management of side effects. Dr. Garon is a physician and researcher at the University of California, Los Angeles. He has been awarded a UCLA Lung SPORE Career Development Award in 2007, a Hirshberg Foundation for Pancreatic Cancer Research award in 2007, the Tower Cancer Research Foundation Career Development Award in 2008, and a Lincy Foundation Grant in 2008. His interests are in gastrointestinal, pancreatic and lung oncology. Dr. Garon sees patients and conducts clinical trials at his private practice in Santa Monica.


The seminar kicks off a new support group geared exclusively to lung cancer patients and survivors. The group will be led by a professional therapist and is free of charge.

Kathy Joosten, a ten-year lung cancer survivor and an Emmy Award-winning actress, encouraged The Wellness Community to form a group to address the specific needs of lung cancer patients and survivors. “I am delighted that they are forming this group because it is essential for lung cancer patients to find support from people who are undergoing the same kinds of fears, expenses, body changes, chemotherapy, and radiation,” says Joosten, who senses a “subtle agreement” among people, even patients themselves, to not talk about lung cancer as much as other types of cancer. She adds, “We need a place where people who have remained silent until now can come together and talk about the disease.” Joosten has starred on many hit television series including The West Wing and Desperate Housewives.