Both of Apple Honda’s showrooms on Route 58 in Riverhead will be festooned with pink and while balloons and pink ribbons all month for the dealership’s sixth annual fundraising campaign to benefit the North Fork Breast Health Coalition.
Apple Honda will donate $50 for every new car sold and $1 for every service order during the month of October, national breast cancer awareness month. Apple has raised more than $34,000 for the coalition since 2013 with the annual, month-long campaign.
Apple Honda general manager Bill Fields said he’s hoping to break a record this year and raise $10,000 this month.
Fields was joined for the campaign kickoff this morning by Apple co-owner Flora Garsten, members of the dealership’s administrative, sales and service teams, North Fork Breast Health Coalition board members, County Legislator Al Krupski, Riverhead Town Supervisor Laura Jens-Smith and Riverhead Town assessor Paul Leszczynski.
One in eight women in the United States will develop invasive breast cancer over the course of her lifetime, according to BreastCancer.org. In 2018, an estimated 266,120 new cases of invasive breast cancer are expected to be diagnosed in women in the U.S., along with 63,960 new cases of non-invasive (in situ) breast cancer.
The North Fork Breast Health Coalition, founded in 1998 by Jamesport residents Antonio and Ann Cotten DeGrasse, provides financial assistance and services to local breast cancer patients. The group’s Helping Hands program offers $1,000 grants to patients coping with breast cancer. The grant can be used for any purpose. It also offers — free of charge — yoga, reflexology, massage, meditation, wigs and scarves.
“We help many, many people right here in our own community, people we know — friends, neighbors, relatives, coworkers,” said NFBHC president Susan Ruffini, who is herself a cancer survivor.
“Every penny that comes to us goes to helping people who need it,” Ruffini said of the all-volunteer organization.
Education remains at the forefront of the group’s efforts, Ruffini said today. Younger women must understand that they should conduct monthly breast self-exams — breast cancer isn’t a disease that’s limited to older women. Just because annual mammograms are not routinely recommended for women under 40 with no family history of breast cancer doesn’t mean younger women don’t get breast cancer.
“We need to do a better job of educating young women about the importance of self-exams, how to do self-exams and what to look for,” Ruffini said.
“Women are often unaware that signs of breast cancer include symptoms other than lumps,” she said. “For example, the appearance and texture of skin is important.” She noted that a new TV advertisement alerts women that skin should not look like the bumpy surface of an orange peel — that’s a warning sign. There are others, she said, such as red spots, itchy breasts, and painful breasts.
Self-exams are crucial in detecting breast cancer, especially in younger women, Ruffini said.
For more information on the monthly self- exam, visit the National Breast Cancer Foundation.
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