The BCAC AGM was held on Friday, November 4, at the Auckland Cancer Society in Grafton. A number of members took the opportunity to meet with the committee and other members and hear what BCAC has been up to over the last 12 months. BCAC Chair Libby Burgess outlined BCAC’s achievements this year and Treasurer Louise Malone provided a snapshot of the organisation’s financial report.
BCAC Secretary, Rowena Mortimer and committee member Jenny Williams also spoke to a short presentation about the development of the web videos, Kiwi Stories of Breast Cancer. The complete presentation will be made by them and BCAC Deputy Chair, Chris Walsh, at the Psychosocial Oncology New Zealand (PONZ) conference in Hamilton later this month. The presentation included insights from Jenny about why she believed it was important for her to appear in the web videos as a woman whose inflammatory breast cancer had completely different symptoms from other breast cancers and as someone whose cancer has advanced. The contribution of all those who agreed to share their stories for the web videos was highlighted.
The formalities of the evening included the election of a new committee for BCAC. All of the existing committee were nominated and are returning to the committee for the next year 2011/2012. While most of the committee is known to you, Jenny Williams joined the committee recently and below is a brief biography to introduce her to you all. Biographies of all our committee members are on the website at http://www.breastcancer.org.nz/About-Us/who-are-we.
BCAC committee for 2011/2012
Chair Libby Burgess
Deputy Chair Chris Walsh
Secretary Rowena Mortimer
Treasurer Louise Malone
Committee Sue Ellis
Moana Papa
Evangelia Henderson
Gillian Wintrup
Jenny Williams
Jenny Williams was diagnosed with inflammatory breast cancer in late 2008 aged 45 and was a very grateful recipient of the then recently funded 12-month course of Herceptin thanks to the campaigning of other BCAC committee members. Jenny lives in Papakura with her husband and is the proud mother of three adult children. Although now dealing with metastatic cancer, she is still studying part-time towards a degree in Social Work – a desire stemming from her work with the parents of children with special needs. She got involved in this when her youngest daughter was born with a rare chromosome deletion. In joining BCAC Jenny hopes to be proactive in education and awareness about the different types of breast cancer and a ‘consumer advocate’ for treatment issues.
