ROCK SPRINGS — It was another successful October for the Sweetwater Regional Cancer Center’s Paint the Town Pink and Ladies Night Out Initiative to raise breast cancer awareness in the community.
As a result, SRCC has received a sizeable grant from the Wyoming Breast Cancer Initiative to promote the event for a fourth year in a row in 2021.
The grant award has been named in honor of Sweetwater County resident Patricia “Tricia” Angelovich for serving as the Pink Ribbon Run’s Pink Flamingo Flock Boss and for her contributions in supporting the Wyoming Breast Cancer Initiative.
“We are so excited and grateful to the Wyoming Breast Cancer Initiative for the opportunity to offer this event once again. We truly appreciate their generosity and are thankful we are able to continue providing education and resources to our community” said Eva Wasseen, a Cancer Center registered nurse.
Wassen said the Center planned and submitted its grant application with an understanding that COVID-19 still may be a factor. The team had to revise the 2020 Hindsight event this past October to align with Public Health recommendations and missed being able to get the community together for an evening, she added.
“We hope that our 2021 Ladies Night Out will be back to an evening together, but have also planned to account for social distancing, if necessary,” said Kelly Sugihara, the Wyoming Cancer Resources Coordinator who is based at the Cancer Center. “Our focus is on keeping people well and generally healthy, even in times of COVID-19.
We cannot forget about routine cancer prevention strategies and screening recommendations or we will have bigger battles to face once the pandemic is past us,” Wasseen said.
Through last year’s grant award, the Paint the Town Pink Initiative was extremely successful as businesses in both Rock Springs and Green River decorated their stores in pink. As part of the initiative, the best-decorated business in each city was awarded a trophy.
There were 15 Rock Springs businesses and 10 Green River businesses that participated with Bi-Rite/Remedies and Golden Hour Senior Citizens Center winning their respective city’s contest.
Rocky Mountain Power also donated $1,000 which allowed SRCC to light up downtown Rock Springs with pink lights. The Center hopes to do the same next year in Green River.
“Rocky Mountain Power has always been a great supporter of our hospital and partner to our Foundation. We truly appreciate their support of our Paint the Town Pink Initiative, as well as many other events and initiatives of our hospital,” said Tiffany Marshall, the Memorial Hospital
Foundation’s Executive Director.
The 2021 Paint the Town Pink event is a collaborative effort with the Wyoming Breast Health Initiative, the Sweetwater Regional Cancer Center, the Memorial Hospital of Sweetwater County, the Memorial Hospital Foundation, and the Wyoming Cancer Resource Services. For more information
on the previous year’s event, visit www.sweetwatermemorial.com.
