Schimmel’s Cancer-Themed Show Is a ‘Room’ for Support

The image that radio host Selma Schimmel uses to promote her syndicated Sunday afternoon talk show, heard on KRLA-AM (1110) from 1 to 3 p.m., is that of a circle of plain, straight-backed chairs. Just as they might look in a standard support group.

That setting, of course, doesn’t work so well acoustically on radio. Instead, Schimmel and her revolving panel of medical and psychological experts on “The Group Room” sit around an intimate U-shaped conference table in a studio at Premiere Radio Networks in Sherman Oaks and talk. There they are joined by other participants--the callers.

The subject is cancer. Cancer in its myriad variations as well as the emotional impact of malignancy, treatment options, the latest research, clinical trials and trials of dealing with HMOs, and communication issues, like having trouble talking to family, friends, a partner, even the doctor.

Schimmel knows the territory well. In 1983, less than two years after the death of her mother from ovarian cancer and then the death of her maternal uncle from brain cancer, this rabbi’s daughter, who grew up in Studio City, was diagnosed with breast cancer. She was just 28, an unusually young age for the disease. A year later, Schimmel founded Vital Options, a support group for people 17 to early 40s, with cancer. That nonprofit organization has since segued into the producing arm of her radio show.

Now heard on 15 stations--including outlets in New York, Washington, Houston and, just recently added, Mobile, Ala., and Lewiston, Idaho--”The Group Room” marked its third anniversary Feb. 11 and has some 300,000 listeners nationwide. It is believed to be the only cancer-themed support program on American radio, and certainly the only one where the screener is a licensed oncology social worker. “Cancer Talk,” a book by Schimmel based on the “voices of hope and endurance” heard on the show, will be published in May.

Meanwhile, Schimmel, a striking, black-haired woman of 44, a self-described “tough cookie” who is also warm and peppy, was just named one of the 100 most important talk-radio hosts in the nation by Talkers magazine. (In alphabetical order, her photo appears above Laura Schlessinger, whose state-of-the-art studio is down the hall.)

The one place she did not have trouble was with syndicator Premiere. Tim Kelly, executive vice president and director of programming, who had just lost his father to Alzheimer’s disease and understood the problems of families facing serious illness, green-lighted the project. “Selma has done the unbelievable job of taking the germ of an idea [a cancer talk show],” he notes, “and turning it into a terrifically viable and helpful, successful radio program.”

It was Kelly who came up with the concept of a group-support session and named the show.

“The growth of the show has been slow,” he concedes, “but on stations it does go on, it does very well. It’s a difficult subject. And, frankly, most radio directors and programmers can’t believe that doing a couple of hours on a weekend, talking about cancer and the very difficult, painful issues that are involved, is going to generate ratings. But as they continue to see support from the community in the form of ratings, you’re going to see more radio stations jumping on.

“This is probably going to be the first of many programs that deal with medical, psychological issues as we baby boomers age, and we start to face these issues--first with our parents and then with ourselves. We’re going to be looking to that great electronic backyard fence that is radio to help share experiences on how to cope.”

On a recent Sunday, when the show dealt with lymphoma, one of the fastest-growing cancers in the United States (and the disease that took the lives of Jacqueline Onassis and King Hussein), the first caller, identifying herself as Louise from Iowa, wondered whether it was unusual to have several lymphoma tumors show up in her legs. “Yes and no,” she is told by Dr. Alexandra M. Levine, chief of hematology and medical director of the USC/Norris Cancer Hospital, it’s “unusual but not unheard of.”

On another recent show, Margaret from New Jersey, calling for the second week in a row, said she had just undergone her first chemotherapy treatment for colon cancer. “How’d it go?,” Schimmel asks. “Good. Good. I managed.” But Schimmel catches something in Margaret’s voice. And emotionally? “Oh, I cried my eyes out. . . .”

Later, Kevin from Los Angeles simply wanted to vent. “I never call talk radio [but] I was driving around, and it’s always a pet peeve with me. Doctors. You go in there for a physical or whatever, and feel like you’re taking time from the doctor’s day. Sometimes doctors need to be more patient.”

For Schimmel, “The Group Room” provides the opportunity to listen and share for people who would otherwise not have access to a group: those who live in rural areas, away from a major cancer center or who are too ill to go to a support group or those, preferring anonymity, who won’t go to a group. She also hopes to convey her own attitude--to not be a “passive” patient but rather a “proactive medical consumer.”

On the lymphoma show, Levine came closest to expressing a philosophy that is the hallmark of “The Group Room.” “No one knows how long you have,” the doctor said. “And the issue, in fact, is not how long but what you’re going to do with the time. And as hard as it is to close your mind to that diagnosis given to you, we all ultimately have the diagnosis of death. We’re all going to go, [so] live every day, appreciate it, as opposed to being fearful.” Levine added softly: “Much easier said than done.”

But sometimes, Schimmel is asked, doesn’t she get depressed by the subject? “I don’t get depressed, I get moved. . . . Sometimes I feel impotent. I can’t take someone’s disease away but I might be able to help someone partner with a physician or a treatment option. When I can’t do that, I will still be present for someone. They have my heart, they have my ears.”

And with “The Group Room,” they also have her voice.