Regional Healthcare Foundation launches digital mammography equipment campaign

There was an emotional launch to the Dr. Noble Irwin Regional Healthcare Foundation’s new campaign to purchase a new mammography machine for the Cypress Regional Hospital.

The Close to the Heart Campaign was launched on Tuesday morning, with the Foundation making a year long effort to raise the $350,000 necessary to buy a new mammography unit to replace a decade old piece of equipment. The breakfast launch event generated a pledge of $30,225 from the capacity audience.

Foundation Executive Director Clay Thompson said the show of support during the emotional campaign start was indicative of the support they expect will rally around this fundraising effort.

“I’m impressed. We kind of thought we would have a pretty good response when we thought about doing something like this to kick off the campaign,” Thompson said of Tuesday’s launch event.

He noted that a couple of years ago the group 100 Women Who Care were active in fund-raising in support of some needed Swift Current projects. So they got in touch with them to make them aware of this new need, and that group has rallied in force to support the initiative.

Thompson said with the Healthcare Foundation entering their second decade of operations, they want to recognize that milestone with a major campaign.

“It’s our 20th anniversary so we wanted to do something that is larger and more special. This is a pretty heavy price tag for just one item, so we thought it would be a great thing to do on a 20th anniversary.”

“More than anything else the new technology that it brings is going to really help detection and diagnosis of breast cancer and of course early detection is the key when you’re talking about breast cancer.”

Thompson added that all of their fund-raising efforts this year will be directed towards the mammography equipment campaign. The proceeds from the Black Tie Hockey Draft and the annual golf tournament in June have already been directed to the campaign.

“We will be planning some different events through the summer months and then we’ll wrap up the campaign for the Mammography unit at our Radiothon at the end of October.”

He added that the staggering statistics regarding breast cancer are also an incentive to improve the equipment.

“One in eight women potentially will be diagnosed at some point in time, and one in 25 men will be diagnosed at one point in time.”

“It was staggering to me, but as I started reading the stats and looking at the numbers, it quickly became another reason it was a no brainer for us to purchase this piece of equipment. If we can help detect it that much earlier it’s just great for the Southwest.”