Yoli Bell, President and Founder of the Mesquite Cancer HELP Society (MCHS), met recently with the Sunshine Rotary Club to discuss services offered by the MCHS, as well as the ground-breaking clinical trials being undertaken using a variant of the polio virus to cure various types of cancer.
Yoli Bell, Founder and President of the Mesquite Cancer HELP Society (MCHS), was a recent speaker at the Mesquite Sunrise Rotary. Yoli founded the 501(c)(3) non-profit organization 15 years ago after realizing the need to provide hands-on assistance to Mesquite cancer patients.
This vital organization depends totally on local funds provided by regular benefactors, small fundraisers throughout the year, and culminating with their major fundraiser, the Valley Rally, an annual golfing event held on the last Sunday of October under the direction of the Oasis Women’s Golf Association.
Through the generosity of the community, the MCHS has been able to assist cancer patients with payment of medical bills, costs of flights to MD Anderson in Texas, as well as with transportation costs to other cancer treatment institutes in the US. The MCHS has an active board of directors who work directly with Yoli to determine the financial needs of each individual applicant. The MCHS has spent over $250,000 during the past 15 years in assistance to residents of the Virgin Valley.
Financial assistance may include costs of prescriptions, hospital and doctor bills, and reimbursement for travel costs and specials needs based on an individual’s circumstance. The MCHS also provides access to wheelchairs, canes, electric chairs and other types of hospital equipment.
A Support Group for cancer patients and their families is held the 2nd Thursday of each month at 2:30 p.m. This group provides: emotional healing, positive thinking, educational guidance and group sharing. Counseling, home visits, and other special needs are fulfilled as deemed necessary. An enormous amount of information on all types of cancer is also available at the MCHS office located in the Deuce Building Complex, 155 N. Yucca Street.
And, since the goal of ROTARY is to eradicate polio, Yoli shared information on a genetically engineered polio virus that is being investigated as a new anti-cancer agent for brain cancer. “If plans go accordingly, a client with Glioblastoma (a type of brain cancer) will be flown to North Carolina by MCHS in the hope that he/she will be a recipient of the recombinant oncolytic polio virus PVS-RIPO,” said Yoli.
For more information about the MCHS, visit their website at www.cancerhelpnv.com. The Mesquite Sunrise Rotary meets every Tuesday at 7:15 a.m. in the Redd Room of the Oasis Grill, 100 Palmer Lane in Mesquite.
