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| Media Contacts Mary Jo Wich Lois Kendall 314-525-4005 |
Release Date: 11/4/2009
Breast Center Manager Honored by African Women's Cancer Awareness Association
Judi Elston (left) and Shawna Willey, M.D. (right), accept the “Light Bearer Award” for advocacy work for women and breast cancer, from Ify Anne Nwabukwu, African American Women’s Cancer Awareness Association.
A little more than a year ago, Judi Elston, manager of the Breast Center at St. Anthony’s Medical Center, responded to a plea for help from an organization whose motto is, “Saving lives, one woman at a time.”
The plea was from Ify Ann Nwabukwu, president and CEO of the African American Women’s Cancer Awareness Association. Nwabukwu recently had returned from a medical mission trip to the Enugu State Teaching Hospital in Nigeria, which had no mammography equipment to help detect breast cancer.
“We saw so many women walking around with visible breast tumors that it was mind-blowing,” Nwabukwu said. “These women needed help! When I saw this, I said, ‘God, please let me make a difference!’ ”
Upon her return home to Washington, D.C., Nwabukwu e-mailed the National Consortium of Breast Centers. She asked if anyone had a mammography unit they could donate. Elston immediately responded.
“I said, ‘St. Anthony’s just happens to have the piece of mammography equipment you need,’ ” Elston said. “We converted to digital mammography, and didn’t use the traditional unit anymore – it is obsolete in our stage of advanced technology, and had no value to us. But it had tremendous value to them, to be able to detect breast cancer in women before they develop a lump.”
On Oct. 30, Elston was honored at the AWCAA’s annual fundraising dinner in Washington, D.C., with the “Light Bearer Award,” presented for her advocacy work for women and breast cancer.
“This is a great honor, both for me and for St. Anthony’s,” Elston said. She called the entire staff of St. Anthony’s Breast Center “the real light bearers of advocacy work for women, as demonstrated by their continued commitment to serving our patients.”
Nwabukwu said, “You will never know what this donation means to us. With this donation from St. Anthony’s, we will be able to live our organization’s motto – ‘Saving lives, one woman at a time.’ ”
St. Anthony’s Breast Center is located at 12700 Southfork Road, Suite 153, in St. Anthony’s Medical Plaza. For more information about the Breast Center, call 314-525-3400.
For information, please call our Health Access Line at 314-ANTHONY (268-4669) or 800-554-9550 or visit our find a physician online.
At St. Anthony's, our vision is to be the area's premier health care organization — and your first choice for health care services.