63 Residents in Crown Heights Are Battling Cancer

For over 25 years, RCCS has been dedicated to helping cancer patients and their families receive the best medical care to help them recover from their dreaded illness. RCCS currently oversees the cases of over 3,100 cancer patients worldwide. With 63 current cases in Crown Heights alone, with many more Shluchim and their communities worldwide!

Very often when a patient is Chas V’Shalom diagnosed, their lives are literally hanging in the balance. One or two days can be the difference between life and death. The worst thing for the patient is not having immediate access to the best care and specialists because they lack the guidance and connections, or because they cannot afford access to the proper care.

Enter RCCS. RCCS acts as a liaison and advocate for the patient, helping to guide them through the confounding maze of physicians, hospitals, and treatments, and pay insurance premiums for those that cannot afford to pay. But more than that: This organization, with its unparalleled connections to the top specialists in the country, procures appointments to the top doctors in the field.

I have been volunteering for RCCS for many years on their applications committee, reviewing cases from the Chabad community all over the world. I have seen firsthand all the amazing work that they are involved in daily. Over the years I have been involved with hundreds of cancer patients here in Crown Heights as well as with Shluchim and their communities worldwide. RCCS has dealt with cases as far out as South Africa and Australia. Boruch Hashem I have been witness to many Nissim working with this organization.

I want to share with you a current story of how RCCS helped a Chabad patient. I was personally involved in the story.

There is a 7-year-old girl, whose parents are Shluchim out west. She was diagnosed a few months ago with Medulloblastoma/brain tumor. The family felt very lost and confused as to how to help their daughter. Someone recommended to them that they reach out to RCCS. From day one, the medical team ensured that she was getting the best treatment possible. They spoke to the parents almost daily and clarified many details when they were too overwhelmed to ask at medical appointments. Unfortunately, where she lived the specific radiation treatment that she needed was not available. After speaking to the staff at RCCS, they arranged for the patient to be brought to New York and have a consultation at Memorial Sloan Kettering, using RCCS’s $4,000 medical subsidy grant. RCCS directed the patient and her family to an insurance broker to be able to identify and acquire the best insurance for her medical needs. Once found RCCS stepped in and paid the girl’s insurance premiums.

RCCS’s care management team helped them find an apartment in NY and helped them logistically in many ways. RCCS helped the patient’s family with RCCS’s catastrophic fund grant obtaining an additional $2,700 for the family as well as a grant that helped them with rent payments. Boruch Hashem the patient is finishing up a few more treatments and her situation is looking promising.

Cancer is a terrible, horrifying, and life-changing disease. RCCS makes sure that our community can fight it. They deal with each case, they provide advocacy, they provide financial backing, they provide emotional support from the very first vital days until the very end, no matter what. RCCS makes sure the members of our community are not left out in the cold in dealing with this dreadful machalah.

Thank you to all the members of our community who have already stepped up and supported this vital organization. Please give Chizuk to the organization and all the Cholim battling this Machlah by donating very generously.

You can donate now by clicking here.

Rabbi Moshe Klein
Director, Crown Heights Branch RCCS