Some Highlights…
1999 The group started as a face to face group in Brisbane.
2001 Commenced delivering the group by telephone in addition to face to face
2002 Grant from the Gambling Community Benefit Fund to evaluate the feasibility and benefits of the weekly face to face and telephone group.
2003 Funding obtained from Queensland Health (Mental Health Branch) and a monthly group for Partners and Families provided.
2004 A Statewide video link up, using facilities of Women’s Health Queensland Wide, held to enable rural women and Brisbane women to connect names to faces.
2005 Preliminary outcomes from standardised measures presented to Dr David Spiegel’s team at Stanford University, California.
2006 Launch of website for the service www.advancedbreastcancergroup.org by Anna Bligh, then Deputy Premier of Queensland.
2006 Presented 12 month outcomes to the Society for Psychotherapy Research Conference in Edinburgh.
2007 Embarked on making a documentary
2008 Publication of article in Journal of Counselling and Psychotherapy Research on clinical effectiveness of group.
2008 Launch of the DVD resource “You’re not alone: a film about living with secondary breast cancer”
2008 Partnered with the Aussie Breast Cancer Forum www.bcaus.org.au
2008 Presented poster on 2 year outcomes to COSA conference in Sydney.
2009 Started the workshops, bringing together and funding costs for all the members of the group and their families and friends at a one day workshop in Brisbane
2011 Launched the DVD “Walking Beside Her. A Partner’s Journey with Secondary Breast Cancer.”
2012 Started the Memory Box project, to explore the space to reclaim old memories and collect new ones.
2013 Received notification from the Newman government that our funding would cease at the end of 2015. We started our campaign to reverse this decision, gathering over 30,00 signatures on our on-line petition, participating in media interviews, seeking and finding support from the community and from the then opposition government, in particular our local member Jackie Trad.
2014 Became a public company; The Advanced Breast Cancer Group Ltd, with charitable status.
2015 The Palaszczuk government re-instated our funding.
2016 Started developing and filming a new resource, this time, with agreement from the women in the group, including the experience of partners and families of women dealing with this disease.
2017 The new film – Post Pink – living with advanced breast cancer – was launched by the Deputy Premier, Jackie Trad, and the Health Minister, Cameron Dick. We also ran workshops in Cairns, one for health professionals and one for consumers.
2018 Ran a workshop in Toowoomba for women with metastatic breast cancer and their families in collaboration with Blush, a Toowoomba based organisation supporting women with breast cancer.
Managing Paperwork
Keep a history of your illness. Include dates of scans and results, as you will be asked these dates often. Ask your oncologist to explain what the results of investigations and tests mean.