Memphis saw fewer breast cancer deaths for Black women from 2013 to 2023, according to a new Susan G. Komen Foundation analysis.
The decline was 2.3% in Memphis and nearby parts of Arkansas and Mississippi. It’s an improvement in an area that ranks as one of the top 10 U.S. metropolitan areas with the worst breast cancer survival rates for Black women.
Yet, despite that decline, the gap between Black women’s and white women’s deaths from breast cancer widened 8% in the Memphis area over that same period.
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“It’s very complex,” Komen executive Dr. Sonja Hughes, an obstetrician-gynecologist, said of the mixed findings for Memphis.
Across the United States, Black women have been 5% less likely than white women to be diagnosed with breast cancer but 40% more likely to die of it. In Memphis, that rate has been as high as 71%.
If you’re diagnosed with breast cancer
Join a breast cancer support group. A University of Memphis study, among others, has found that breast cancer patients with the best chances of survival tend to have the support of their families and communities. Memphis support groups include an affiliate of Sisters Network Inc. and of the Komen Foundation.
West Cancer Center and Methodist Healthcare are among the hospitals with support groups. Such national organizations as the African American Breast Care Alliance and Touch, the Black Breast Cancer Alliance, have members all over the country.
Enroll in clinical trials. Breast Cancer Now is among the organizations helping people enroll in trials of new drug therapies.
The Komen Foundation pledges that all participants in trials it supports will receive an established or experimental drug, not a placebo containing no medicine. The highest scientific standard for testing the efficacy of new treatments is the randomized double-blind trial, where neither participants nor researchers learn who was given an actual drug until the trial ends.
Medical and community-based groups are striving to broaden the public’s knowledge of existing breast cancer treatments and the lack of therapies for aggressive forms of the disease, disproportionately affecting Black women. They are attempting to raise awareness of how diet, body weight, environmental toxins, lifestyle, socio-economics and genetics are among the driving factors. A father’s advanced prostate cancer, for example, might raise his child’s risk of developing breast cancer.
“For so long, people treated cancer as if it was a taboo subject. No one talked about it, no one wanted to name it,” said Dr. Melanie Crutchfield, a breast cancer surgeon at Methodist Healthcare Cancer Institute in Memphis. “Talk to your family to figure out who had what and at what age. That could save your life.”
University of Tennessee Health Sciences Center breast cancer researcher Athena Davenport said deeper studies of Black women with and without the disease are critical to achieving better cancer health care and making the risks better known.
“Women with breast cancer who live in high-poverty ZIP codes [for example] have a higher proximity to [polluting] traffic. There’s a higher number of Super Fund [environmental clean-up] sites. I’m sure all of that plays a role,” said Davenport, who teaches in UTHSC’s department of genetics, genomics and informatics.
“We’re seeing some positive change in the disparities in the 10 cities … ” said Hughes. “Certainly, there are things that are bigger than us, where we have not been able to move the needle enough: access to care, implicit bias, things of that nature.
“All we can do is continue to educate providers, continue to educate patients, continue to advocate for policies and systems to knock down those big barriers. We’re not giving up.”
Prevention
Self-examinations, early screenings and self-advocacy at the doctor’s office are critical to diagnosis and care, advocates and care providers say. They urge women — about 1% of breast cancer patients are men — to:
Regularly examine and know what’s normal for your breasts. Get familiar with the healthy look and feel of your breasts, including whether one is larger or hangs differently than the other.
Abnormal dimpling, discoloration, inflammation, swelling and discharge can be signs that something is wrong. Also, more than Asian and white women, Black women’s breasts are dense, making it harder for a mammogram to pinpoint possible disease. Denser breasts raise breast cancer risks 1.7-fold, according to a study published in February 2025 in the American Journal of Epidemiology.
Most mammograms are free. The Affordable Care Act requires most insurers to fully pay for mammograms that screen for breast cancer in women who are at least 40 years old. It also mandates insurers to pay for genetic counseling for women whose family medical histories place them at higher risk for the disease, and for counseling to determine if those at higher risk should take anti-cancer drugs that might keep them from developing the disease. Tennessee’s Medicaid program, TennCare, also provides free screenings for women who meet certain income requirements, are uninsured or underinsured.
Tap into other free resources. The Komen Foundation trains and offers to match individuals with patient navigators via telehealth. Other organizations, including some hospital systems, train navigators, including nurse navigators. They help patients resolve questions about medical treatment, insurance coverage, where to find financial assistance during what can be costly cancer care and other treatment-related issues. Some navigators schedule appointments for patients and show up alongside them.
Again, seek out clinical trials, including those expressly seeking Black women. The American Cancer Society has enrolled 5,000 Black women from all 50 states in a long-term, largest-of-its-kind observational study of all cancers. Launched in 2024, the Voices of Black Women study has an enrollment goal of 100,000 Black women aged 25 to 55 who have never been diagnosed with cancer. It aims to measure how dietary intake, physical activity, sleep habits, engagement with clinicians, use of chemical hair relaxers, wealth, poverty, experiences with racism, prescribed and other medicines, community involvement, and an array of other everyday factors might or might not influence cancer’s development.
Health and criminal justice journalist Katti Gray’s news coverage has appeared on ABC.com, CBS.com, and in The Guardian US, the Los Angeles Times, Newsday, Reuters, The Washington Post and other publications.
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