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The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society’s Man & Woman of the Year campaign is a national ten-week campaign to raise funds to help find cures for blood cancers. The campaign includes individuals in the community who agree to utilize their leadership abilities and resources to conduct their own fundraising campaigns to help The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society fund blood cancer research and provide education and support services for patients and their families. The male and female candidates who raise the most funds during the campaign will be awarded the title of the chapter’s Man & Woman of the Year, respectively. Candidates are judged solely on their success in raising money, each dollar counting as one vote. Their totals are then considered for the national title. Candidates run in honor of the Boy & Girl of the Year, who are local blood cancer patient survivors and sources of inspiration to others.

The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society (LLS) is the world’s largest nonprofit organization dedicated to blood cancer research, education and patient services. LLS was established in 1949 as the deVilliers Foundation, named in memory of Robert Roesler deVilliers who died of leukemia at the age of sixteen.

LLS has 64 chapters in the U.S. and Canada.

PROGRAMS:

RESEARCH: LLS has invested more than $600 million in research, more than $71 million in fiscal year 2009 alone. Programs like the Specialized Center of Research (SCOR), which brings together teams of scientists from different disciplines and our Translational Research Program, which funds research with a high probability of producing innovative patient treatments in an accelerated time frame, have directly contributed to many breakthrough cancer treatments. LLS funds hundreds of researchers across the globe. Research funded by LLS has led or contributed to standard treatments such as chemotherapy, bone marrow and stem cell transplantation and new, targeted oral therapies such as Gleevec®. In addition, LLS-funded research has resulted in treatments for many other types of cancer.

PATIENT SERVICES: LLS provides a wide range of services to patients such as family support groups, a peer support network, an extensive educational web site with web “chat” support programs, free seminars and conferences, a toll-free Information Resource Center staffed by Masters-level nurses and social workers, and patient financial aid.

ADVOCACY: LLS’s advocacy program has provided a strong voice in Washington, DC, representing the health care quality and medical research interests of patients and their families to policy makers at all levels of government.
Visit website: http://www.mwoy.org/nca/