At the 2025 Academy of Oncology Nurse & Patient Navigators (AONN+) Annual Conference in New Orleans, Louisiana, Matthew Zachary, We the Patients, New York, New York, returns as the keynote speaker, discussing the evolving landscape of cancer culture, policy, and patient empowerment in the oncology space. 

He emphasizes the critical role of navigation as both a right and a necessity for patient dignity and survival.

Transcript:

Hello again, AONN+. This is Matthew Zachary, 30-year brain cancer survivor, founder of Stupid Cancer, host of the "Out of Patients" podcast, the longest standing man-yells-at-cloud and healthcare show in the country. I'm also the executive producer of the "Cancer Mavericks" documentary on Spotify. 

And now, I'm the president, founder and CEO of We the Patients, America's first cancer patient rights voter block movement. I'm excited to return for my third time. First, as an attendee, then as your keynote and then back again as your keynote. I'm thrilled to be there in New Orleans. 

The theme of my presentation here is a little different. I'll be telling the saga of Matt. A bit of context: 30 years of fighting the system and somehow staying alive, but the gist is now how culture is changing, how policy is changing, how the landscape is changing. American consumers who happen to be cancer patients are way more savvy now to what's going on in the system that is designed to hurt them and to mess them up and to screw things over for them, when all they really want is to live and survive with a sense and a semblance of dignity. That is where you guys come in.

This is really about the truth of navigation, what that really means in 2025 and for the next 10 or 15 years of cancer patient advocacy. It is the secret roadmap, the cheat codes that you possess that no one who enters the cancer store knows. They're reliant on a system to guide them through this with as little cholesterol in the artery as possible. While at the same time you are the empaths, giving them permission and the prescription to be angry, but a channel to navigate their care in a way that reduces harm, ends anxiety, and ideally helps them survive with the quality of life and the longevity that they deserve. 

At the end of the day, navigation should be a right. Is it enshrined in the Constitution? No, but it should be. What does that look like from consumer protection laws in the [United] States that would mandate this type of thing?

What we're going to take away from this is that we need to organize as a medical community, as a patient community, as a proprietor community, as a pharmacist community, into how do we become a voter block? How do we become a community that has power at the ballot? What does it take when we organize? What are the laws we are going to demand of our elected officials? How do we become the upstream of offense and not the recipients of downstream on the defense? 

That is my big takeaway plus a reveal of my book coming out next year and a bit of a surprise at Lincoln Center happening next April. Anyway, that's the gist. I’ll leave you on a cliffhanger. I'm so excited to see you there.

Source:

Zachary M. Keynote Session: We The People. Presented at AONN+ Annual Conference; November 6-9, 2025. New Orleans, LA.