Multi Award-Winning Actress and Oral Cancer Survivor Blythe Danner Speaking at the Oral Cancer Foundation 10th Annual Fundraiser Walk

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Apr 24, 2024, 15:30 ET

WHEATON, Md., April 24, 2024 /PRNewswire/ -- Blythe Danner has played smart, witty roles in her long career in film, small screen and stage; complex characters approaching a diverse set of difficulties and life challenges. With a rich life of becoming others as an actress, it's often forgotten that her personal life has been equally complex, one in which the role she has lived adds dealing with tragedy as well. In 2002, her husband, Bruce Paltrow, died at age 58 from oral cancer. Then in a rare turn of events, Danner was diagnosed with a similar form of oral cancer herself. That journey included treatments both numerous, and difficult. She is in remission now.

This 25-year oral cancer journey has added a new set of roles for Danner. These include oral cancer widow, oral cancer advocate and spokesperson, oral cancer patron to the Oral Cancer Foundation, Oral Cancer Foundation board member, oral cancer patient, and ultimately oral cancer survivor. As part of her personal mission to raise awareness about the disease, she is the keynote speaker at this year's 10^th annual DMV Oral Cancer Walk on Saturday, April 27.

Organized by The Oral Cancer Foundation, this event won't be the first that Danner will have attended. She became a passionate advocate after her husband's death, which came less than three years after his diagnosis. Surprised and devastated by this cancer she knew little about, Danner became a determined advocate, helping to raise money and awareness about this terrible disease in cooperation with the Oral Cancer Foundation. As a result of early detection, the very efforts Danner had been advocating for after her husband passed, her own oral cancer was discovered, and reaffirmed her commitment to the cause. For more than 20 years, Danner has been a significant supporter of the Oral Cancer Foundation by filming PSAs, speaking at galas, and using her appearances on numerous TV talk shows to inform the public about the disease.

As an honored guest at the 10^th annual Oral Cancer Foundation Walk, Danner will share her story and promote the life-saving importance of early detection, but she says that one of the best things about this event is getting to spend personal time with other people who have been through the heartbreak, grief and the hope that come in any cancer journey.

"I'm so grateful to the Oral Cancer Foundation for providing a place for the public, medical professionals, families of those lost, and survivors to come together and honor the incredible strength it takes to deal with a life-altering oral cancer diagnosis," said Blythe Danner. "And to remember the loved ones we've lost." In keeping with the foundation's many missions in the early discovery realm, free oral cancer screenings will also be provided at the event to anyone in attendance.

Participants can sign up for the walk and learn more about the event at: https://ocf.donordrive.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=donorDrive.event&eventID=850

For more information about the interesting history behind this event please visit: https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/the-inception-of-the-10th-annual-dmv-oral-cancer-walk-302115576.html?tc=eml_cleartime

For more information about oral cancer, its diagnosis, and treatment, visit the Oral Cancer Foundation's website at www.oralcancer.org.

About the Oral Cancer Foundation

The Oral Cancer Foundation is a national public service, IRS-registered 501(c)3 head and neck cancer charity designed to reduce suffering and save lives through prevention, education, research funding, advocacy, and patient support activities. Oral and oropharyngeal cancers are the largest group of those cancers that fall into the head and neck cancer category. Common names for it include such things as mouth cancer, tongue cancer, tonsil cancer, and throat cancer. Approximately 58,500 people in the US will be newly diagnosed with oral cancer in 2024, and one person will die every hour of the day, 24-7-365 from it. This includes those cancers that occur in the mouth itself (salivary gland cancers, tongue cancers, mucosal soft tissue cancers), in the very back of the mouth known as the oropharynx (primarily tonsil and tonsillar crypt and base of tongue), and on the exterior lips of the mouth. For more than a decade, there has been an annual increase in the incidence of oral and oropharyngeal cancers. This is expected to continue as there is no uniform national screening policy or protocol, and the disease's risk factors remain relatively unchanged. For more information, visit www.oralcancer.org.

SOURCE Oral Cancer Foundation