VPCA members have been busy
Fauquier County “Power Up for Cancer Control”. On September 27, 2007
at the Fauquier Hospital in collaboration with Fauquier Hospital, the
Lake Manassas Cancer Center, the Westminster/Potomac Hospital Us TOO
Support Group, the local ACS Board, the Patient Advocate Foundation,
“I’m Still Me”, CPAC, and five local physicians. Speakers spoke on prostate cancer and breast cancer to an audience of over 50 residents from Fauquier, Prince William,
Loudoun and Rappahannock Counties. Free PSA blood tests for prostate cancer detection for 22 men and breast exams for 11 women were done just prior to the educational presentations. Photo attached – VPCC at Fauquier Hospital, left to right – Heidi Whitesel, Ron Perrault, Dick Gillespie at community forum, staffing the registration table.
Fauquier County Health Fair
Stunning Success at the Marine Corps Marathon Health Expo! From October 25 -27, 2007 prior to the race, nine members of the VPCC and FCRE team again participated with a booth at the Marine Corps Marathon Health and Fitness Expo at the DC Armory. The VPCC/FCRE team gave out material to 3,456 Expo attendees, nearly triple the number of contacts we had last year. For the first time we also reached all 30,000 registered racers with an FCRE card on prevention included in each of their “goodie” bags. Just by our presence, even those who passed our booth were exposed to a critical idea: that people can take steps to help prevent this disease. Our sharp looking ideally positioned, upgraded booth flanked by our stand-up banners from VPCC & FCRE, allowed many contacts with young men and women – an ideal audience for our messages of prostate cancer awareness and prevention.
VPCC Chairman attends Us TOO University. On November 2 – 4, 2007 Dick Gillespie,
VPCC Chairman and also a Us TOO chapter leader, attended the Us TOO University weekend in Chicago. The Us TOO international leadership convenes these sessions periodically to update chapter leaders and officers. The session was jam-packed with new information about the disease and about improving chapter operations.
Particularly interesting is the new tone Us TOO has drummed up with to deal with prostate cancer. Cancer survivors are to be “Warriors” in overcoming their own disease and also eliminating all prostate cancer. This new Warrior theme derives from the need to dispel patient despair and isolation, which shortens survival, but instead to inculcate
optimism and openness, which extends it.”
