Our Board

Rachel Co-founded OvaCare with June Feeney in 2011, having carried out fundraising over the last number of years for UK’s ovarian cancer charity Ovacome, following her mother passing away in March 1999. After moving to Ireland and meeting June at an Ovacome fundraiser in 2010, they were both passionate in the belief that Ireland would benefit from a national ovarian cancer charity that could improve diagnosis and raise awareness of ovarian cancer in Ireland, through sharing global research and best practice with other ovarian cancer charities around the world and working closely with our medical panel. Rachel was also diagnosed with the BRCA 1 gene mutation in 2018 and had the necessary preventative surgeries following that. Rachel is a Company Site Director and Life & Business Coach and lives with her husband David and daughter Maya in Sligo.

June Co-founded OvaCare in 2011 following her own diagnosis with ovarian cancer in 2009. She felt there was very little support in Ireland for women and their families affected by the disease and believes strongly that OvaCare can help give them a voice. Meeting Rachel in 2010 was the catalyst in getting OvaCare off the ground, and together they jointly Co-founded OvaCare’s Board of Directors. June is a qualified human resource generalist and lives in Co. Waterford with her husband Michael and daughter Niamh.

Margaret became a director in Sept 2022. She had been involved with OvaCare for over a year previously in a support capacity. Margaret has extensive experience in finance having worked in the Financial Sector for 36 years as a strategic Senior Customer Service Manager with experience in communications, managing people, dispute resolution both as a facilitator and investigator, marketing, operations excellance, budgeting and processes efficiencies.
Margaret brings that knowledge to her role as Treasurer of OvaCare She was also Chair of Staff Charities with the financial company she worked in and is very proud of the significant funds raised by fellow staff and that company to help many worthy charities. She is currently self employed as a Senior Operations Excellence Practitioner and is a Certified Mediator. Margaret Lives in Cork with her husband, has three grown up children and four grandchildren.

Sharon O’Toole is a Senior Research FellowScientist in Trinity College Dublin working in the area of ovarian cancer. She qualified with a BSc Hons in UCG in 1994 and then completed an MSc Biotechnology in 1996. Having worked in industry she then returned to research and completed a PhD in Trinity College in 2003. She has gained enormous experience in the area of ovarian cancer and has played a major role in the development of studies in gynaecological cancer. She was instrumental in establishing INNOVATION- the Irish National Network for Ovarian Cancer Collaboration which has brought together the medical, research and charity organisations involved in ovarian cancer in Ireland. She was part of the organising committee of the first World Ovarian Cancer Day on May 8th in 2013 and this has now become a very successful annual event. She also sits on the board of the Irish Society for Gynaecological Oncology with a responsibility for Public and Patient Involvement (PPI).

She was invited by the founders of OvaCare to establish and chair a medical panel for the charity which will ensure that it is kept up to date with the latest developments and to advise on issues relating to ovarian cancer. She lives with her husband Pat and 3 children in Dublin.

Francesca Kay became a Director of OvaCare in 2021. After moving to Ireland, Francesca was keen to find a way to help people in her new home, having heard about OvaCare and its drive to support women and their families with Ovarian cancer she was delighted to join the Board. Francesca is an experienced senior civil servant and so brings a strong focus on governance and the need to ensure, together with all Board members, that OvaCare is run in a transparent and ethical way in line with Charity regulations. This must always be done with the support of women and their families staying at the heart of everything we do. Francesca lives in Cork with her husband and has 2 grown up children who still live in the UK. She is the Chief Information Office at the Central Statistics Office and has lived in Ireland since her move in 2021.

Catherine is a senior communications professional with over 28 years’ agency experience designing and delivering award-winning strategic communications programmes, improving agency client’s reputations and business results.

She worked with the Health Promotion Unit of the Department of Health for eight years (1999 to 2006) delivering ten health promotion campaigns a year. She also worked on major change management campaigns including the introduction of the smoking ban which involved building compliance, and rolling out smoking cessation campaigns, working with the Department of Health and key stakeholders. A standout moment for her was achieving 98% compliance when Ireland was the first country in the world to introduce the smoking ban. The campaign was based on fact, working with credible international and national experts and research studies.
Catherine works with the Irish Network for Gynaecological Oncology (INGO) delivering campaigns for World Ovarian Cancer Day on increasing awareness of symptoms using the BEAT acronym, and on World Gynaecology Oncology Day raising awareness about Uterine Cancer.
Catherine has a BA International in French and Economics from UCD and the Université de Rouen and a Postgraduate in Communications from the PRII.