October 19th is Max’s Day. We honor the day because it marks Max’s birthday. At the very same time, we honor all the people who have been helped in his name.
Max’s name has become a symbol of hope around the world through the work of The Max Foundation. And beneath it, lifting it higher and higher for all to see, are more than 70 team members and countless advocates across different sectors all working together to expand treatment access for people facing cancer. You all choose to wake up every day and honor Max’s name and build his legacy. For that, I am forever grateful.
At The Max Foundation, we often say, “Access to treatment is access to life.” They are words we live by and make manifest through our extensive network of partner healthcare providers and a Humanitarian PACT among our corporate partners: key pieces of a treatment access model that delivers medicine to people who need it, just like Max needed.
Throughout October, we are asking ourselves and our friends around the world to consider what access to treatment means for each of us. So, as we embrace Max’s Day with honor and reflection, I ask you to reflect on a simple question: what does treatment access mean to you?
Pat Garcia-Gonzalez is the CEO of The Max Foundation. Under Pat’s direction The Max Foundation is dedicated to accelerating health equity by delivering medication, technology, and services to patients facing cancer and other critical illnesses, focusing our energy on those who no one else is helping. Pat lives in Edmonds, Washington, where she raised her four sons.
Being a patient or I better call myself and others as a Spartan, someone who is fighting for something each and every day.” –Thilip Kumar Ragavan
We first met Thilip Kumar Ragavan in May 2014. He was a young chronic myeloid leukemia Spartan in the patient workshop at Hospital Ampang and was newly diagnosed with CML at that time, but the smile never left his face. Bright, vibrant, energetic, and positive – that’s Thilip.
Living with cancer can be overwhelming, to say the least. People with chronic myeloid leukemia (CML) have to take daily medication, travel to clinics, and carefully monitor their symptoms, on top of working and caring for their families. This has been Kiran’s reality for around 15 years – he was diagnosed with CML when….
For World Cancer Day, GlobalWA interviewed Max CEO Pat Garcia-Gonzalez to hear about the many lessons she has learned in this work, and how both cancer treatment and patients’ access to treatment globally has changed.
