Education, celebration on fall schedule for Susan G. Komen Ozark

Susan G. Komen Ozark, the local affiliate of the national Susan G. Komen organization, has been going strong for nearly 20 years, says Executive Director Lauren Marquette.

"We were incorporated in 1998 and are celebrating our 20th annual Pink Ribbon Luncheon, and we'll have our 20th Race for the Cure in April," she says. "We're very excited!"

Marquette says this local chapter was started when Springdale's Gaye Cypert, a breast cancer survivor, decided she could do more to help women facing a breast cancer diagnosis.

"She saw the need to raise awareness for other women, and she knew there was a need for women to reach out for services," says Marquette. "So she got together with a concerned group of woman and started working on it. We started with six counties that we covered, and over the years, we've added four more, including a county in southwest Missouri."

Seventy-five percent of donations raised locally stay local, says Marquette, while 25 percent goes toward funding for the scientific research grants the national organization helps distribute in the fight to eradicate breast cancer.

"What started out as a small group of concerned and good-hearted individuals has turned into $10.5 million of donations in local services and $3 million of donations given back to research," she says. "Komen set a bold goal last year: We know that 40,000 people a year pass away from breast cancer. We set a goal to reduce death by breast cancer by 50 percent, so our research portfolio has shifted to concentrate on the kind of breast cancer that kills -- metastatic and stage four breast cancer -- and to make sure that we're putting research into breast cancer detection."

Marquette says she is particularly proud of the fact that so much of the money raised locally helps local women retain easy access to medical care.

"We fund things like gas cards [to drive to and from treatment appointments], genetic testing to see what you should be looking for and bilingual assistance to make sure women don't slip through the cracks. It's scary enough hearing you have breast cancer, it's even scarier hearing it in a language you don't understand. We do pay for screenings, but in the state of Arkansas, with the Medicaid expansion and the fantastic breast cancer program here, we've been paying less and less because women are covered."

The local grant process is deliberately democratic, says Marquette.

"One of the things that we do at Komen which I personally love is, when we go through the granting process, we get local community members from all different parts of the area and all walks of life, and we assign our grant applications to them. They score it, and we spend a whole day where we sit down and we hash through every single application. What's getting funded is based on the merits and impact that that application is going to have, based on the needs and priorities that affiliate has identified. We know who we fund every year -- we get to know them really well."

Marquette says the public policy arm of Komen Ozark had a significant victory this year when they successfully teamed up with legislator Greg Leding to pass Act 543.

"We were getting phone calls in our office from women who were getting prescribed oral chemotherapy," says Marquette. "They had good insurance, but it wasn't getting covered because it was under the prescription plan instead of medical, and it was upwards of $5,000 to $10,000 a month. Oral chemotherapy is new and cutting edge, and that's why it wasn't covered -- we wanted to make sure insurance companies kept up coverage of new treatments. The legislation passed with flying colors, and it makes sure that oral chemotherapy is covered at the same rate as IV chemotherapy. It's scary hearing that that's your best bet, and not being able to pay for it."

October is National Breast Cancer Awareness month, and Marquette says Komen Ozark is "hitting the ground running," starting in September.

"September will mark our third year of the annual BigWig Campaign," she says. It's a grassroots fundraising campaign that we do the first week of the month. The BigWig campaign solicits notable community members to wear a bright pink wig to raise breast cancer awareness. "We'll be revealing who our BigWigs are and announcing our biggest BigWig in October," Marquette says.

The organization's 10th annual Swing for the Cure golf classic is scheduled for Sept. 22, with the Pinktail Partee preceding that on Sept. 21. "Our executive sponsor for the golf tournament is Paul Beahm, SVP for health and wellness at Walmart," notes Marquette.

"And a week after that, we've got the Paint the Park Pink event, which is a walk for survivors," Marquette says of the Oct. 7 event at the University of Arkansas at Fort Smith.

The nearly two-month span of events will culminate with the Pink Ribbon Luncheon on Oct. 20 at the Northwest Arkansas Convention Center in Springdale.

Though September and October have a decided concentration of events aimed at highlighting awareness of detection, treatment and eradication of breast cancer, Marquette says that Komen Ozark is committed to providing these services throughout the calendar year.

"One of the things that we started last December is our Survivorship Series," she explains. "We brought in a Komen scholar whose research is in metastatic breast cancer. We wanted to show what the research that our money goes to looks like, and what it accomplishes. We also had two local oncologists, a radiologist, a social worker, who all talked about what to look for after diagnosis -- when to call your doctor, the fear of re-diagnosis. And we had a panel and opened it up to survivors. It was so thought-provoking, we decided to turn it into a series and offer it quarterly.

"In July, we did a body image and intimacy training, and had some local social workers and nurses who talked about how your body changes after your treatment and how to talk to your significant other. The next one is the week of our golf tournament, Sept. 19, and will include information about what you need to know about genetic testing."

NAN Profiles on 09/03/2017