By Katie McElveen
Proving that a club can be as comfortable as a private home for a small event, the IMI Club New York was the site of a very special fund-raising dinner on September 18, 2007. The purpose of the special gathering—which included cycling legend and cancer survivor Lance Armstrong and clothing designer Tory Burch among the twenty guests—was to raise money for the Ralph Lauren Center for Cancer Care and Prevention.
“The Ralph Lauren Center helps those who are underserved get through the experience of having cancer,” said host Dee Dee Ricks, who made a commitment to raise $2.5 million for the organization just three weeks after being diagnosed with breast cancer. “Once I found out I had cancer, I had to go through a lot,” she recalled. “But it didn’t take me long to realize that I’m one of the lucky ones. I can afford to do whatever it takes to fight my cancer. My experience made me
realize the disparity between me and someone on welfare. I wondered how a woman who is jobless and homeless could
possibly handle it.”
Inquiries about how she could help less-fortunate cancer patients led Ricks to Dr. Harold P. Freeman, the president and founder of the Ralph Lauren Center for Cancer Care and Prevention, a community-based institution for the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of cancer. The Center, located in Harlem, was created from a generous gift by the Polo Ralph Lauren Corporation and is a partnership between Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center and North General Hospital.
A renowned surgeon, administrator and professor, Freeman had noticed early in his career that the death rate for cancer in the Harlem neighborhood where he practiced was nearly twice that of more affluent areas. Over the next thirty years, as he worked in all levels of cancer treatment and prevention with national, international and local organizations, he realized that the key to survival was to find a way to aid patients in getting treatment sooner. “Poor people die from cancer because they’re poor,” he told a recent interviewer. “Many of them could have been saved if they would have gotten to the doctor sooner.”
With that in mind, he developed Patient Navigation, a pioneering system of patient care which offers poor and uninsured people help navigating around whatever barriers—language, for instance, or a lack of insurance—are keeping them from receiving a timely diagnosis and treatment of cancer. Utilizing this system—as well as research, education and outreach programs designed to address the unique needs of the community—the Harlem-based Ralph Lauren Center has had a positive impact on cancer survival rates in the area. “Words can’t describe the emotions I felt when I spoke with Dr. Freeman,” recalled Ricks. “I knew then and there that there was no greater cause than the Center.”
Throwing herself into her commitment, Ricks went to work. Knowing that Lance Armstrong would be in town for another event, she decided to organize a fund-raising dinner for a small group of friends and colleagues. Instead of charging her guests, she would host the event herself and let her guests give from their hearts. “I thought a dinner would be a great opportunity for 5 or 10 couples to meet Lance and Dr. Freeman and learn about the Center,” she explained. “I knew Mike [Collins, CEO of IMI] and had been to the Club and thought it would be a perfect venue for this event. It’s one of the few places in the city we could go that offered the level of privacy that we needed. It’s truly exclusive.”
