Meet Hester
Hester Hill Schnipper, LICSW, BCD, OSW-C is the Manager of Oncology Social Work, Emeritus at Boston's Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and was the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation's first Hatcher Professor of Survivorship. She has been an adjunct professor at Simmons College School of Social Work, Boston University School of Social Work and has taught at the Harvard Medical School. Hester was the Breast Cancer Patient Advocate for RevolutionHealth.com and now writes a blog for the BIDMC Cancer Center: https://www.bidmc.org/about-bidmc/blogs/blog-landing/living-with-cancer. Since leaving BIDMC, Hester has devoted herself to a private psych-oncology practice, continuing the work she loves with cancer patients and their families.
A nationally known speaker, Hester has written numerous articles for professional journals about issues for both breast cancer survivors and professional caregivers; she is a contributing writer to MAMM and Cancer Today magazines. Hester has authored two books: Woman to Woman: A Handbook for Women Newly Diagnosed with Breast Cancer and After Breast Cancer: A Commonsense Guide to Life after Treatment. She is a past President of the Association of Oncology Social Work; in 1991, she received its Oncology Social Worker of the Year award, and, in 2007, its Leadership in Oncology Social Work award. In 2005, Hester was named Boston's Exceptional Woman in Healthcare by radio station 106.7, MAGIC.
In 1993 and, again in 2005, Hester was diagnosed with breast cancer and treated with surgery, radiation, chemotherapy and hormone therapy. These diagnoses transformed her life's work into her life. She has two adult daughters and lives, gratefully, with her husband in Concord, Massachusetts.
