Chemo is isolating. A care kit says someone sees you.
Inside every Chemo Care Kit is a hand-sewn port pillow so the seatbelt stops pressing on a fresh chemo port, ginger chews for the nausea, and cozy socks for cold infusion rooms. National brands and everyday donors fill the kit. Volunteers sew the pillows. Your gift sends the box to a cancer warrior’s door.
100% of every kit donation goes to procuring the kit contents and its shipping.
We take the hard part out of accepting help
When you hear the word cancer, everything changes. So does life for everyone who loves you. They want to help. Most have no idea how.
Rachel Minion started Beyond Basic Needs after her own cancer diagnosis, to give support networks a real way to show up. Not a card. Not a casserole. A Chemo Care Kit, packed for the exact moments chemo brings.
We run lean and we run honest. Our board is all volunteer, we take no government funding, and 100% of what you give for kits goes to procuring the kit contents and getting it shipped.
A kit built by many hands
A Chemo Care Kit is not bought off a shelf. It is donated, sewn, and shipped by a community that believes no one should face chemo alone.
Donors fill the kit
National brands like LMNT and Sock Club give by the case. Individuals fill in the rest by buying comfort items straight from our Amazon Wish List.
Volunteers sew the pillows
Makers across the country hand-sew the port pillow, the cushion that keeps a seatbelt off a tender chemo port on the drive to treatment.
Your gift sends it
Donations cover packing and shipping. A finished Chemo Care Kit lands on a cancer warrior’s doorstep, usually within two weeks.
Every item has a reason
Nothing in the box is filler. Each item answers a side effect a cancer warrior told us about, from the nausea to the cold infusion rooms to the days you do not recognize your own face.
- Hand-sewn port pillow
- Back scratcher
- Ginger chews for nausea
- Lip balm for cracked lips
- Cozy socks
- Soft eye mask
- Tattoo eyebrows by My Two Brows
The port pillow is the heart of the kit. It tucks between the seatbelt and a chemo port so the ride to treatment is more comfortable.
Every kit is packed by hand, so the contents vary with what is donated and in stock. Not every item appears in every kit.
Three ways to put a kit in their hands
Give, shop, or sew. Each one ends the same way: a Chemo Care Kit in the hands of someone who needs it.
Give
It costs about $12 to pack a kit and ship it to a cancer warrior, and 100% of your kit gift goes there. No overhead comes out of it.
Donate Now →Help Us Restock from Amazon
Buy a few comfort items from our Amazon Wish List and they ship straight to us for the next build. The fastest way to put your hands on a real kit.
Open the Wish List →Sew a Port Pillow
If you sew, your hands can make the pillow that provides comfort to a cancer patient on their way to treatment next month. We send the pattern and tell you exactly where it goes.
Become a Maker →Corporate Build Days keep this work alive
Your team does not need another offsite. They need two hours they will still talk about in December. A Build Day turns one afternoon into hundreds of Chemo Care Kits, addressed to cancer warriors in all 50 states.
This is also how Beyond Basic Needs stays funded. When your company sponsors a Build Day, you cover the kits your team packs and keep us reaching the cancer warriors on our waitlist.
What your team gets
- 100 to 1,000 kits packed in a single session
- Turnkey setup, we ship everything
- Impact photos and cancer warrior stories to share back at work
- Kits delivered to a local cancer center in your company’s name
What a kit means on a hard day
It was really nice to receive this box. It’s a great pick me up when you dont know future. Thank you from the bottom of my heart. I know you didn’t have to do this as you have no idea who I am, but I’m so appreciative.
The items was a huge hit and a welcome to my mom who is fighting Triple Negative Breast Cancer. The socks and electrolyte mix is something that she uses everyday!
Thank you so much for the package. This has been a hard journey and I am thankful for people like Beyond Basic Needs for showing they care. A million times, Thank you.
I know what that first day feels like
I was diagnosed with appendix cancer in my mid-thirties. The minute you hear the word cancer, life changes in ways only a cancer warrior can describe, and not only for you, but for everyone in your corner.
When I came through it, my husband and I built Beyond Basic Needs so the next person would not have to face treatment feeling alone. Every kit we send is the help I wish someone had handed me.
Rachel MinionCo-founder, Beyond Basic Needs
Requests just jumped tenfold. We need help keeping up.
Over the past year, requests for Chemo Care Kits have climbed from 20 per month to 200+ per month. That is hundreds more cancer warriors reaching out as they start the hardest stretch of their lives.
Here is the hopeful part. The comfort inside is already donated. It takes about $12 to pack a kit and put it in the mail, and 100% of what you give for kits goes straight there.
The hands behind every pillow
Companies keeping this work alive
Trusted where cancer warriors are treated
Our kits reach patients through leading cancer centers and hospitals across the country.
Hear from the cancer warriors you help
A short note now and then. A kit that landed at the right moment, a build day, a way to help. No noise.