AHSC helps Asian immigrants afford breast cancer care
PORTLAND, Ore. - We're just a little over a month away from the annual Race for the Cure. Seventy-five percent of the funds raised stays in Oregon and Southwest Washington to help fight breast cancer.
Some of the money is distributed to local organizations dedicated to breaking down financial, cultural and language barriers. For immigrant women like Young Mee Kim, it's a life-saving service.
Kim fought breast cancer 13 years ago when she was just 35 years old. Thinking of those days brings back strong emotions. Through a Korean interpreter, Kim says the day her doctor told her about the diagnosis was like being handed a death sentence.
"When you hear 'cancer,' death is what comes to mind, and so I thought I'm going to die," she said.
Then two years ago, the unimaginable happened. Kim found out that the cancer returned. To make matters worse, she no longer had health insurance.
"For people without health insurance, it's one thing to find out you are sick and have cancer, the main concern is finance. How am I going to pay for all this? Because of this, the pain is doubled," she said.
So she turned to the Asian Health and Service Center in Southeast Portland.
AHSC helped Young Mee Kim with interpreting, setting up appointments, paying for treatment and getting the support she needed during her recovery process.
"Through AHSC this was all resolved so I felt a bit more relieved and could focus on just my fight with this disease," Kim said. "If it wasn't for AHSC I'd be in a very difficult situation and my recovery would probably have taken longer."
The center's mission is to reduce health disparities and increase access to high-quality health care for all Asians.
The AHSC received $250,000 from the Susan G. Komen for the Cure over the past eight years to help prevent and fight breast cancer.
Maria Park, the Asian Health and Service Center's Program Coordinator, says their partnership with Susan G. Komen for the Cure allows them to educate women about breast cancer and help them overcome language, cultural and financial obstacles.
"We're so thankful in that we were able to help them," Park said. "(It’s) so rewarding and it's so great to see healthy families."
In 2011, AHSC was awarded the "Grantee of the Year" by the Susan G. Komen for the Cure for its work in helping 56 women get the help they needed.
The AHSC is hosting a community health fair that includes free clinical breast exams on Saturday, August 18, 2012, from 11a.m. to 4 p.m. at its office at 3430 S.E. Powell Boulevard, Portland, Ore.
"Kim fought breast cancer 13 years ago when she was just 35 years old."
"So she turned to the Asian Health and Service Center in Southeast Portland"
Through a Korean interpreter...... Are you kidding me? She has been here this long, and still needs an interpreter? Who pays for these interpreters?
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 @jonsiesd2 Immigrants like her don't have perfect English so it's just easier to have interpreters in those situations. She obviously came here when she was old, too old to go to school to actually learn the language. She probably had to work the whole time she was here and knows the English she uses at work- conversational and whatever else she normally uses. Don't be rude. You don't know what she's been through or what her life is like.Â
The country she is from should pay for her treatment, not us.
 @sortbait If she's an immigrant from so long ago, she probably got her citizenship here. Meaning she is an AMERICAN CITIZEN. Her country is now AMERICA. So what's the problem? Same as you.Â
 @sortbait Just like Obama care...
Oh Wait that was romney care.
Anyone who wants to come to this country and contribute to its greatness and reap the benefits of living here, should bother to learn the language. I don't know how long Kim has lived here, but I sure hope that it hasn't been the entire time since her initial diagnosis 13 years ago .... although I fear that's the case. One more thing that Komen does with their funds, that I disagree with. Why is it so incorrect to want to help American women first?? I'm so tired of feeling obligated, under the threat of being labeled racist, to help immigrants before Americans.
 @badcat  Why is it so incorrect to want to help American women first?? Â
But that would be Obama care and you Hate that right???
@cptmac11 What makes you think I'm against socialized health care? I don't recall ever saying that, and I think people who refer to it as "Obamacare" are usually completely ignorant on the topic. What's your problem, mac?
 @badcat A tad dated, and the nationalities listed have changed quite a lot -- but, the idea is still very pertinent:
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"There is no room in this country for hyphenated Americanism. When I refer to hyphenated Americans, I do not refer to naturalized Americans. Some of the very best Americans I have ever known were naturalized Americans, Americans born abroad. But a hyphenated American is not an American at all... The one absolutely certain way of bringing this nation to ruin, of preventing all possibility of its continuing to be a nation at all, would be to permit it to become a tangle of squabbling nationalities, an intricate knot of German-Americans, Irish-Americans, English-Americans, French-Americans, Scandinavian-Americans or Italian-Americans, each preserving its separate nationality, each at heart feeling more sympathy with Europeans of that nationality, than with the other citizens of the American Republic... There is no such thing as a hyphenated American who is a good American. The only man who is a good American is the man who is an American and nothing else."
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-T. Roosevelt
@ThePosterFormerlyKnownAsPhredE @badcat
Well said. My thoughts exactly.
@badcat Where does it say that the Susan J Kormen foundation helps immigrants before Americans? Don't be ridiculous.I have Asian relatives who are here legally who sometimes have difficulty with language and differences in culture.You conservatives seem to hate anybody who isn't a white,heterosexual,republican,christian male.It's beyond disgusting.
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@2nd Baseman I have a Asian sister in law who does have problems with language barrier and is HIV positive and is receiving assistance.Should my brother take her back to her own country because YOU don't like the fact that she is getting assistance for her medical condition? I think my brother would have some choice words for you.
 @noneofyourbizzness  @badcat Typical hate filled comment by a liberal.  Who wants to take other peoples money and give it to others who dont work.
@sortbait @badcat Typical conservative.Always making the assumption that anyone receiving any kind of assistance of any kind regardless of the reason is stealing your money.Get over yourself.
@badcat Amen
@dmj@badcat
 Why is it so incorrect to want to help American women first?? Â
But that would be Obama care and you Hate that right???
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