will always be remembered as someone who lent a helping hand to fellow celeb breast cancer patients.
Through the years, the former Beverly Hills, 90210, star candidly shared her cancer battle with the public, which began when she was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2015. Doherty went into remission in 2017, but shared nearly three years later during an appearance on Good Morning America that her “cancer came back.”
In June 2023, Doherty revealed that her breast cancer had spread into her brain. Us Weekly confirmed her death at age 53 in July 2024.
Following her death, stars and fans with their own cancer battles came forward sharing Doherty’s impact on them. Variety’s , who was diagnosed with ovarian cancer in 2016, recalled Doherty offering to connect her with her “amazing” doctors.
“The best example that I can continue to set for other people with cancer, and to the outside world who doesn’t have cancer is to show them what a cancer patient looks like,” Doherty told Kate in 2021. “We are employable.”
Scroll down to see the celeb breast cancer patients who Doherty helped:
Olivia Munn
After Munn was diagnosed with cancer in 2023, she reached out to Doherty, whom she “remembered how she bravely let the world into her journey.”
“We became instant friends — which I honestly couldn’t comprehend at times because watching her on [Beverly Hills,] 90210 was everything to me when I was 10,” Munn wrote via her Instagram Story in July 2024. “We bonded through a shared battle and a desire to help other women. Looking back on the last text she sent me just a couple months ago, she asked how I was doing and if she could do anything for me.”
Munn continued, “True to form, Shannen was offering her support even though she was in the final stage of fighting this horrific disease. Cancer is really f—king scary and Shannen faced it with such dignity, strength and grace.”
Amy Robach
Robach reflected on Doherty’s death, recalling their initial meeting on GMA when the Charmed star announced her stage IV diagnosis.
“Shannen Doherty, that one has been hard for me today,” Robach said on her “Amy & T.J.” podcast in July 2024. “I got to do the sit down with her when she announced in 2019 that she had stage four metastatic breast cancer, and she had such an impact on me because we were diagnosed two years apart initially. And she was declared cancer free. I was declared cancer free.”
Robach learned of her own breast cancer diagnosis in 2013. “Every cancer is different, but she and I connected and she knew she was in a fight for her life,” she added. “I just always marveled at her bravery. I loved her as Brenda Walsh on 90210. So I was so excited to get to actually meet her.”
Robach continued, “That was the first time I got to meet her, but I was blown away by her and her vulnerability and her willingness to share her story to help other people get through really tough times.”
Robach noted that Doherty’s “bravery in fighting it” and “taking it very publicly, it helps so many people going through that same battle.” She added, “It’s a very sad day that she lost her battle.”
Robach concluded her tribute by recalling a quote that Doherty told her during the interview. “She said, ‘Charlie Brown says to Snoopy, YOLO Snoopy, you only live once. And Snoopy said, you got it wrong, Charlie Brown. You only die once. We live every day,’” Robach said. “And that was how she chose to live these last few years.”
Robin Roberts
After Doherty announced her stage IV cancer diagnosis on GMA in February 2020, Roberts commended the actor. (Roberts revealed her own breast cancer battle in 2007.)
“She is showing how to live with cancer,” Roberts said on-air while talking with Robach. “And it is very difficult — we know this — to go public with something because people treat you differently. She had a fear that she would not get work because of that, because people look at you differently, so for her to come forward now —.”
Robach interjected to add that Doherty was “so brave, so courageous and [has] a lot of fight in her.”
