ODDS AND ENDS

As this week winds down, there are a couple of odds and ends to share.  In no particular order....

The Odds....

WNYC which is an NPR station has teamed up with Clear Health Costs to gather as much information about the costs of routine mammograms.  Specifically, it's the Brian Lehrer Show.  If you've been for a routine mammography and you have the information, I believe you can input and submit right from this page by filling out the form below.

This is a whole new language.  This, my friends, is called crowdsourcing and THIS is the power of social media.  I haven't had a routine mammogram in seven years so my information isn't helpful.  The more people who provide information, the more effective this information becomes.  We are in the era of Big Data.  It's spilling over and from the cheap seats, it appears this holds tremendous promise for significant advances in medical research.  We need to participate for this to work.  If you can, please do.  If you have a blog, the "embed" code should work from here, too.  Consider sharing in a blog post.  According to the folks at WNYC, they expect this will run for about one more week.

Genes.  Just because the case was heard by the Supreme Court, we can't leave this on the back burner.  This is important enough to keep in the forefront.  A decision is expected some time in June in the case against Myriad. Still having a hard time wrapping your brain around the science? There is a pretty witty (and short) video on the ACLU website.  Nothing better than teaching with humor.




AND The Ends.....

A shout out to the Avon Foundation for doing the right thing when it comes to the breast cancer walks.  Transparency.  The proceeds from each walk are announced shortly upon completion of the walk.  A good portion of the proceeds stay within the community where the walks are held.  I'm thrilled to see that Alamo Breast Cancer Foundation was awarded $50,000 for the advocate scholarship program that I attended last year at the San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium.  A big thank you to the Avon Foundation.  When December rolls around, there will be several new advocates running around and leaving with tremendous knowledge thanks to ABCF's terrific program.

If you take a look at their funding, you will see it is helping on many levels.  In addition to helping the underserved, they are funding programs within hospitals and they are supporting research.  It's a good balance.

And, they have partnered with Army of Women.  It's the Love/AVON Army of Women.  Avon Foundation provides funding for AOW.  I am always happy to lend my time and my voice to support the programs of Susan Love.  I'm really happy to lend my face, too...  There are new signs for the tables when we staff events.  One of the signs?  Have a look!

With that, I'm off the grid for the next 48 hours.

Happy Mother's Day to all and a very special message of love to kTC.

And most importantly: I love you, mom.