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By WAYNE ALLEN

PDT Staff Writer

More than $25,000 was raised during National Breast Cancer Awareness Month. Proceeds will benefit SOMC’s Compassion Fund.

The SOMC Compassion Fund helps cancer patients afford some of the necessities of treatment.

“The Pink Out was an overwhelming success,” said Wendi Waugh, director of SOMC Cancer Services. “This money is going to help the people of our community, be more compliant with their cancer care. This money is going to relieve stress during a critical in a patient’s life. I really believe that stress is one of the biggest factors that you have to overcome when your undergoing cancer treatment.”

Waugh tells the story of a patient who recently came to the Cancer Center.

“Her husband was spitting up blood,” Waugh said. “She was telling me that their brother-in-law had a heart attack. We were giving her a gas voucher and she was like, ‘You don’t know how important this is to me. How it means the difference whether we can get him here or we can’t.”

One of Waugh’s goals with the Pink Out was to sell 6,000 T-shirts to the community.

“I am overwhelmed by the support this community has shown with this gesture,” Waugh said. “We hear a lot about the bad things that go on and we forget how well we can pull together and about all of the good things going on in this community.”