Most of us have been impacted by cancer. If you want to contribute to gynecologic cancer, please read my suggestions in Gynpath-Silva.com

 I have seen many situations when patients feel grateful towards their physicians and would like to make a monetary contribution to help the medical community. There are two different scenarios. The patient might want to give something to the physician who treated him or her without any specific goal, which is a very nice gesture; however, uncommon. The most common situation is when a patient wants to assist with the research of his or her cancer. The patient gives the contribution to the treating physician but, usually the most important person in the group involved in the treatment is the pathologist, who made the diagnosis. I have seen many cases where the pathologist not only makes the unusual diagnosis, but also needs to explain to the treating physician, the details of this rare cancer. Since the treating physician is most likely not doing research on the infrequent diagnosis, the money gets lost in inconsequential steps. I have seen millions of dollars lost this way.

The issue is, how does the patient know how to contribute in a way that will have an impact for the specific disease in question?

The following steps could be a possible solution:

1-Advertise on social media, i.e. LinkedIn, Facebook, X, Instagram, etc., that you would like to donate money to improve the care of the disease in question.

2-Request a one-page proposal from the possible recipients.

3-When you get the proposals, consult with physicians and researchers, any experts on that subject. Be aware that some researchers will request your donation to continue working in this specific area. Check the number of years they have been working in this area, what kind of impact their research had on the care of patients, not on getting grants.   

4-Select the proposal that has a clear hypothesis and includes a deadline to get results. Look for innovation!

In this way, social media allows access to any physician or researcher around the world, and this results in a more significant contribution to improve the care of future patients.