Braman Family Foundation and HWCOM partner to“drive out” breast cancer from our community



The Braman Family Foundation has partnered with the FIU Herbert Wertheim College of Medicine (HWCOM) to bring 3D mammography, the latest technology in breast cancer screening, to Miami-Dade County’s most needy and most vulnerable communities.

A $1.1 million gift from the Braman Family Foundation will allow the HWCOM to offer the state-of-the-art screenings at its Linda Fenner 3D Mobile Mammography Center, the first of its kind in South Florida. 3D mammography detects more breast cancers with fewer “false alarms” than standard or digital mammograms alone.

“The Braman Family proudly dedicates this mobile breast cancer center in Linda’s memory, in the hope and expectation that women in our underserved community will receive the finest medical care available,” said Irma Braman, whose youngest sister Linda Fenner died of breast cancer in 2005 at the age of 54. “Linda was an inspiration for all, belonging to a cancer support group, earning the respect and love of so many others. She never gave up hope, traveling the world, never complaining, believing almost to the end of her life, that there would be a tomorrow,” said Braman.

The mobile mammography center will provide services to women already enrolled in the College’s innovative Health Education Learning Program, NeighborhoodHELP™, which sends medical students into the most underserved neighborhoods so they can learn to appreciate the social determinants of health while helping families improve their understanding and access to care. The initiative to put this new technology on wheels and drive it into the community came out of alarming statistics from those very neighborhoods.

“We were shocked by the statistics. Some of the communities we serve through NHELP™ have the highest rates in the nation of breast cancer detected in late stages: 46-59 percent. The national average is 39 percent, the average for the rest of Florida is 35 percent,” said John A. Rock, HWCOM founding dean and vice president for health affairs.

Executive Associate Dean for Academic Affairs, Carolyn D. Runowicz, M.D., was also appalled by the rates of advanced breast cancer in these communities. “One of the factors is clearly access to health care,” said Runowicz, a gynecologic oncologist and herself a breast cancer survivor. “By increasing access to breast cancer screening to our NHELP™ families, we anticipate a reduction in the incidence of advanced breast cancer, and thus mortality”.

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