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Health Coalition Receives Donation to Provide Screening Mammograms
Martinsville, November 4th, 2009 Staff from the Julius Hermes Breast Care Center of Memorial Hospital (JHBCC) donated $2125 today to the Martinsville Henry County Coalition for Health and Wellness (the Coalition). The money was raised and donated in an effort to provide more uninsured women with screening mammograms through the Coalition’s mammogram assistance program. In honor of Breast Cancer Awareness Month, the combined staff of the JHBCC, Hospital Auxiliary of M-HC, the Coalition and the Virginia Foothills Quilt Guild joined together in a community project to raffle a quilt with the proceeds going to support the mammogram assistance program.
The Coalition began the program in 2006 with grant funding from the Hermes Family Fund of the Martinsville Area Community Foundation. Funding from the Martinsville Area Community Foundation has continued to support the program each year and Memorial Hospital and the local Radiology group assist by providing exams at a discounted rate. With this support, the Coalition is able to provide mammograms to uninsured women in this community who would otherwise be unable to obtain one. In 2008, 49 women were able to receive these exams through this program and 84 mammograms have already been provided this year.
Each year, the need for this program in our community becomes more important as women continue to lose access to health insurance through job loss or continued unemployment. “Over half of the people that participate in the Coalition’s programs do not have access to affordable health insurance,” stated Barbara Jackman, Executive Director of the Coalition. “The fact that so many working-age women are experiencing difficulty affording these screening exams is all the more serious when you realize that when breast cancer is found in its earliest stages, the chance for successful treatment is the greatest.”
This year’s fundraiser set out with the simple goal to raise more money than last year. With the overwhelming response to the quilt stitched by members of the Virginia Foothills Quilt Guild, the group more than doubled the funds raised last year. The Coalition anticipates that 28 local women will be able to receive screening mammography exams that otherwise would be unaffordable as a result of this effort.
Martinsville-Henry County Coalition for Health and Wellness is a 501c3 organization, funded by the Harvest Foundation. More information on the Coalition can be found online at www.healthycommunitymhc.org.
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