Sometimes a chance meeting can have profound consequences. Last fall Kelly Arnott, a Burlington race organizer, happened to meet radiologist Dr. Arlene Franchetto in The Hamilton General Hospital.
Dr Franchetto shared some of her frustration over the necessity for the Henderson and General sites to share a breast coil. A breast coil is an accessory for an MRI machine which images the breast, chest wall and underarm. It is used to diagnose breast cancer and follow response to treatment.
The General presently does about a dozen breast MRI studies per month. There are usually at least 20 women on the waiting list. With its own breast coil, the General could do about 4 times as many studies per month.
Ms Arnott in turn, shared her own outrage with her friend Dr. Rose Jeans, owner of Advanced Rejuvenation Medical Spa in Burlington. For many that would be the end of the story, but not for Ms Arnott and Dr. Jeans. As a medical practitioner for almost 20 years, including as a department head in the Hamilton system, Dr. Jeans was well acquainted with such budget restraints, but she agreed with Ms Arnott that women in South Central Ontario needed greater access to a breast coil at the Hamilton General Hospital. The question then became how to get one.
Together they came up with a plan of action.
"Since I used to be on staff at The General , Dr. Franchetto and I were acquainted, so I contacted her to find out what a breast coil would actually cost. Kelly decided to donate the proceeds of VRPRO's annual HSBC Chilly Half Marathon & Frosty 5K (run on March 1st this year) to the cause and Advanced Rejuvenation generated publicity as well as donating prizes to the race, " said Dr. Jeans. "But we realized that if we wanted to make a real go of it we'd have to get hospital staff onboard too, so I started off by talking with the MRI techs. They had to get onboard with our fundraising goals."
And get onboard they did. They were excited to find such champions for a service they want to expand. Ms Arnott arranged for Nancy Hastings, a trainer at Second Wind Conditioning, to help the techs, who dubbed themselves "The Rack Pack" to prepare to run in the race themselves. They've been busy training and gathering sponsors since November.
It is easy to sponsor online by visiting The Running Room (http://www.runningroom.com/
This is a piece of equipment that can potentially save many lives. With the breast coil, both breasts, the chest wall and the sides to the underarm area can be seen. This allows for earlier detection, detection of secondary tumours in the other breast, detection of tumours in the lymph glands under the arm and detection of tumours in the chest wall. Breast MRI with the breast coil does not replace mammography as a screening test for breast cancer but breast MRI is revolutionizing diagnosis and treatment in high-risk patients, especially younger women.
Additional information about the fundraising project is available at http://10yy.wordpress.com
Dr Rose Jeans can be reached at 905-340-0401 or doctorrose at restoringnaturalbeauty.com
Kelly Arnott can be reached at vrpro at sympatico.ca
Dr. Arlene Franchetto can be reached at 905-527-4322
Nancy Hastings can be reached at 905-335-8375 or nancy at secondwindconditioning.ca
