2021 Winners
C2 Catalyst for Care Award
Unite for HER
Represented by Susan Weldon, CEO & Founder
For 12 years, Unite for HER (UFH) has supported more than 9,799 patients and delivered over 75,000 integrative treatments and, in 2021, expanded its programming nationwide. When Sue Weldon was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2004, she searched for information on therapies that would complement standard medical treatments. She discovered a lack of easily accessible resources on nutrition, medical acupuncture, oncology massage, meditation/yoga, counseling, and other patient-care resources that enhance one’s health and wellbeing. Inspired by her experience, Sue founded UFH to support funding and delivering of integrative therapies to breast- and ovarian-cancer patients at no personal cost.
C2 Catalyst for Change Award
Tomma Hargraves
Lung Cancer Advocate & Volunteer, Lung Cancer Initiative of North Carolina
Tomma Hargraves is a lung cancer survivor and patient advocate. In 2006, she was diagnosed with stage 3b non-small cell adenocarcinoma lung cancer and, after a successful outcome from a clinical trial, became active in advancing the importance of lung cancer awareness and treatment by raising funds for research and patient support. She has served on the Board of Directors for the Lung Cancer Initiative of North Carolina and advocated for a gas-card program to improve patient care access. She also serves as a Patient Lay Navigator at the Lineberger Cancer Center at UNC-Chapel Hill and serves on the Patient and Family Advisory Board. Tomma lives in Raleigh, North Carolina, with her husband, Bob, and chocolate lab, Miss Charlie Kenan Chocolat.
C2 Catalyst for Equity Award
Equal Hope
Represented by Anne Marie Murphy, PhD, Executive Director
Equal Hope, originally the Metropolitan Chicago Breast Cancer Task Force, is dedicated to saving lives by eliminating health disparities in women’s cancers in Illinois. Equal Hope has developed a unique model to understand health disparities through a lens of access to healthcare quality and healthcare resources and has successfully led Chicago to be the #1 city in the United States for reducing breast cancer deaths for African American women. This success led the organization to expand to other women’s cancers. The organization was the first recipient of the Healthy Chicago Award in 2014 and received the Hearst Population Health prize with an honorable mention for its efforts to improve population health and eradicate health inequities.
C2 Catalyst for Precision Medicine Award
Colin Pritchard, MD, PhD
Director of Clinical Diagnostics, Brotman Baty Institute for Precision Medicine of UW
Dr. Colin Pritchard has devoted his professional career to advancing precision oncology and, specifically, to developing innovative molecular diagnostics for detecting mutations that guide therapeutic decision-making for cancer patients. More than 100,000 patients have directly benefited from clinical tests using assays developed, validated, and interpreted by him and his team. Dr. Pritchard is a Professor and Head of the Genetics Division in the Department of Laboratory Medicine and Pathology at the University of Washington in Seattle, Director of Precision Diagnostics for the Brotman Baty Institute for Precision Medicine, and Co-Director of the Genetics and Solid Tumors Laboratory at the UW Medical Center.
President’s Award
Margaret Stauffer
Chief Mission Officer, Cancer Support Community San Francisco Bay Area
As Chief Mission Officer for Cancer Support Community San Francisco Bay Area, Margaret Stauffer manages Cancer Support Community’s high-quality, comprehensive support services. She develops new programs, provides clinical supervision to therapists and counseling interns, conducts program evaluations, serves as a community resource, and conducts outreach through community and professional presentations to increase accessibility to all people impacted by cancer. Stauffer is a nationally known trainer of the evidence-based program “Open to Options” and as a noted psychosocial-oncology expert. Since she began at Cancer Support Community, she has substantially grown both the number of individuals served and program utilization. Stauffer enjoys travel, reading, and daily walks in the healing space of nature.
2021 Finalists
C2 Catalyst for Care Award
Finalists for this award bring high-quality cancer care to underserved populations. Consequently, their work drives change at the community-, neighborhood- or hospital-level that results in better cancer care for more people.
C2 Catalyst for Change Award
Finalists for this award significantly improve the cancer care experience for people with cancer and their loved ones. As a result, the work of these finalists makes a people’s experience as easy as possible during an extraordinarily difficult time.
C2 Catalyst for Equity Award
Finalists for this award have worked to overcome longstanding racial and ethnic disparities in cancer care, ensuring that all people have equitable access to quality care.
C2 Catalyst for Precision Medicine Award
Finalists for this award significantly advance precision medicine in oncology to bring new, more personalized tests or treatments to people with cancer. As such, these finalists enhance the ability to provide the right treatment for the right patient at the right time.
