Upper Township cancer survivor: It was a great experience
BEESLEYS POINT — When more than 700 cancer survivors, cancer patients and their supporters descended upon Capitol Hill last week to lobby Congress, Beesleys Point’s Marcia McCulley was among them.
It was the American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network’s annual Lobby Day and Leadership Summit, and survivors such as McCulley fanned out to implore the federal representatives to protect funding for cancer research and prevention.
McCulley, a 1989 Ocean City High School graduate, is director of a local cancer center. She also is a breast cancer survivor who is deeply concerned with early detection, which she credits for saving her life, and access to innovative treatments.
McCulley said she has a political background at the state level but hadn’t done a lot on the federal level. That changed last week.
“To be down there with 750 people who all have the same vision and mission and caring about cancer patients, it was impressive,” she said last week after returning from Washington, D.C. “To walk on Capitol Hill and see all the American Cancer Society blue shirts was a really great experience.”
She was encouraged to go because the Cancer Action Network (CAN) needed someone from the state’s Second Congressional District and they knew she worked in politics at one point, works at a cancer center now and is a survivor.
“It was an opportunity to go down and fight for my cancer patients,” McCulley said. Her personal experience added to the impetus to go.
When she started working for AtlantiCare, she decided to do all her health screenings, which included a routine mammogram. She wasn’t experiencing symptoms, having any pain or noticing any lumps.
“It was just a simple screening mammogram and I found out I had breast cancer,” she said. “It was just a routine screening and it saved my life. Obviously there’s a reason why we have them and the importance of them.”
When she speaks to groups, she added, “I think it kind of hits people that, ‘Wow, she had breast cancer and she had no idea.’”
A CAN delegation met with all of New Jersey’s representatives, including the Second District’s Jeff Van Drew.
The delegation was there because of the looming Sept. 30 deadline to pass a new federal budget. The Cancer Action Network points out that over the last three decades, substantial regular increases in federal cancer research funding has led to outcomes that have reduced cancer mortality rates by 34 percent.
The worry is that future cancer cures are in jeopardy because of unprecedented reductions in research funding, policy shifts at the National Institutes for Health, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the National Cancer Institute.
The network said the administration’s proposed $18 billion cut to the National Institutes of Health has fortunately been rejected by congressional committees.
McCulley said Van Drew was very supportive.
“I considered ourselves very lucky with all the legislators we met with that day. They all support cancer research and some of them have signed on as a co-sponsor of the bills. I think Jeff has always shown himself to be a supporter. He’s a dentist, but he’s in health care and I think he understands the importance,” she said.
McCulley believes it was a worthwhile effort as CAN members spread out to meet with all of the different representatives and senators and said that she would do it again.
“I will continue to lend my voice and make sure we fight for research and screenings and fight for the cancer patients who can’t fight for themselves,” she said.
McCulley and other members of the network asked members of Congress to support the bipartisan Medicare Multi-Cancer Early Detection Screening Coverage Act and to extend health care tax credits to make insurance more affordable. The credits are set to expire at the end of the year.
McCulley said the American Cancer Society is fighting for additional research into screenings for other types of cancer.
“Hopefully some day there will be a screening tool for pancreatic cancer so we can catch that and treat that and save lives,” she said. “I definitely consider myself fortunate and I like having a good story to tell to get women to take charge of their health.”
Lights of Hope
A key fundraising event for the American Cancer Society is Lights of Hope Across America, which took place this year Sept. 16 on the National Mall in D.C. during the Cancer Action Network’s visit to the capital.
It was the 15th annual event and the plan was to surround the pond at Constitution Gardens with white paper bags decorated in honor of cancer victims and lit from the inside.
This year there were some 85,000 bags on display. One of them was for Mikenzie Helphenstine, a former Ocean City Primary School teacher and coach who succumbed to cancer on May 4, 2022 after a years-long battle.
McCulley said she was proud to take some bags down for Lights of Hope, including the one for Helphenstine.
“I was able to take a bag down to honor her. Seeing all of the bags was impressive. Unfortunately, it began to rain, but some of the bags were brought inside a tent. I was thankful one of them was Mikenzie’s bag, so it didn’t get ruined,” she said.
The display, she added, puts a human face on the disease when people see all the tributes to those lost.
– By DAVID NAHAN/Sentinel staff
