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Sunday, July 10, 2011

DuPage-area hospital staffs dance for cancer awareness

6/22/2011 9:28 AM



Dr. Brian Ayuste does a little break dancing Tuesday at Adventist Bolingbrook Hospital. Dr. Ayuste and others were creating a musical video that organizers hope to use as part of a breast cancer awareness program.


By Megan Bannister ..


Flash mobs recently have gotten a bad rap around Chicago.

But on Tuesday, employees from four area Adventist hospitals set out to increase breast cancer awareness with a much more lighthearted, positive and true-to-the-idea take on the flash mob concept.

At 8 a.m., as the electronic beats of Taio Cruz's song “Higher” echoed through the halls of Adventist Bolingbrook Medical Center, more than 100 employees from all four hospitals, many dressed in pink, converged on the lobby to do a little dancing.

The physicians and other staff members from Bolingbrook, Hinsdale, LaGrange and GlenOaks were creating what they hope will be a popular and effective music video that will encourage more women to get mammograms.

“Everyone has been so enthusiastic and willing to chime in and take part,” Jeannine Arias, regional director in charge of breast cancer services, said.

Physicians and employees donning pink scrubs, sunglasses, feather boas and Hula Hoops boogied to the beat for video cameras.

Throughout the morning, participants pranced through the OR, danced around the ER and shimmied in the cath lab. To ensure everyone could participate, the flash mob was repeated throughout the day, Arias said.

The video compilation will be used in the Adventist campaign “Stomp Out Breast Cancer” and be released to YouTube in October for Breast Cancer Awareness Month.

While the crazy outfits and dancing is fun, the larger aim of the project is health related. The Adventist campaign encourages all women 40 and older to get annual mammograms in the hopes of catching more cases early on.

“We wanted to extend our reach and let everyone know what services we provide,” Arias said. “It's a nice way to see the hospital and what we offer without having to go there.”

“This is all about getting women screened early,” Dr. Jason Goliath, medical director of the Bolingbrook Hospital Breast Center, said in a written statement. “We see younger people who don't think they need to get screened, but it makes all the difference when it comes to survival rates.”

Though there are more than 2.5 million breast cancer survivors in the United States, one in 35 women will die of breast cancer.

Until there is a more effective cure, organizers of Tuesday's event said, the employees of Adventist Bolingbrook Hospital will keep on dancing.


Source: http://www.dailyherald.com/article/20110621/news/706219840/#ixzz1RkduK7Vq
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