Women for Women

Foundation fund provides life-saving breast cancer detection services

Patricia Wall is a pastor’s wife and mother to three grown children. Her husband’s parishes have always been small and, therefore, unable to provide health insurance benefits to their clergy or staff. “We raised our children bathed in prayer,” Wall said. “And we have always trusted in the Lord’s ability to provide what we have needed.”

Farm life, a stint in the military, bible college, nursing assistant training, mission experiences and the often repeated call to move to a new parish became the norm for the Wall family.

Over the years, and despite the family’s limited household income, Wall had been conscientious regarding her personal annual physicals. She knew the importance of pap tests and mammograms. In recent years, she was introduced to Women’s Way, a program that offers free pap and mammogram testing to qualified women, and was elated to learn that she qualified. From that point on, her pap tests and mammograms would be financially covered. This provided her great relief.

In the fall of 2006, Wall’s routine mammogram revealed something suspicious. “We want you to make an appointment for a gammagram,” her family doctor said.

The gammagram, formally known as breast-specific gamma imaging or BSGI, is a new tool that can help identify cancerous breast tissue undetected by mammography. Wall knew the test would be expensive, but she also knew that she needed to find out just what was going on inside her breast. The Lord would provide. He always has.

What she didn’t know was that the Medcenter One Foundation had a fund to help women just like her—women who were uninsured or underinsured—women who needed a gammagram, but could not afford it. Just days after the scheduled test, she received the call that would wash away her financial worries.

“I have some good news for you,” the caller said. “Medcenter One is covering your bill. Merry Christmas.”

Wall was overjoyed. Her prayers had been answered.

Wall’s gammagram was followed by a biopsy and careful and continuous monitoring. While her concern of cancer has not been fully eliminated, she no longer needs to worry about how her bills will be paid. The Medcenter One Foundation stands ready to help her when that next gammagram is scheduled.

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“I should have been able—but it was just not possible”

Edwina Kloster* had already battled breast cancer once. Three years ago the rural North Dakota woman stoically endured a lumpectomy, six rounds of chemo, nausea, fatigue and the subsequent loss of her beautiful thick, red hair.

Early this spring, Kloster’s mammogram showed five spots. “It was like the air had been sucked out of the room,” said Kloster reflecting on that day. “I had made the trip to the clinic alone. My husband was working at the ranch. I returned home and, not so patiently, waited for him to come home.”

“While the news was hard on us, it was even harder for us to tell the kids,” Kloster said. Still, they rallied behind their mother as her physician scheduled her for Medcenter One’s new breast specific gamma imaging test—known as the gammagram. Her physician was convinced that this was the best option for Kloster, bypassing the previous standard of needle biopsies. The test, painless and quick, would positively confirm the presence of cancer if, indeed, Edwina’s cancer had returned.

Everyone breathed a sigh of relief when the gammagram showed only scar tissue. Nothing else. Scar tissue.

Kloster’s test was covered through a new fund set up within the Medcenter One Foundation by Dr. Ted Fogarty, a Medcenter One radiologist, and other donors who wanted to make sure that all women, regardless of their economic status, would have access to this state-of-the-art technology.

Kloster admits her heart will carry the burden of fear forever. None-the-less, she is grateful that the gammagram was made available to her. Her husband concurred, adding, “You know, it makes a person feel bad to know that you aren’t able to cover the costs of these tests yourself, but with the cost of insurance these days, there is no way. We could never afford to buy health insurance. I should have been able to pay for Edwina’s test, but it was just not possible.”

*real name withheld

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