When thousands of runners and walkers leave the starting point at the Hope 4 L.Y.F.E Annual 3K-5K this year, they will be saving lives. Their efforts will raise money so that uninsured women will have access to life-saving mammograms free of charge at Community Health of South Florida Inc. (CHI).

 

Hope 4 L.Y.F.E. is a 3K/5K Walk/Run fundraiser started by Palmetto Bay resident Angela Roberts who felt the urge to help others. It began with one of the hardest years of her life in 2000. That’s when Roberts watched as stomach cancer ravaged her father’s body and she consoled several friends and relatives diagnosed with breast cancer.

 

“You hear about it, but until it happens to someone close to you and you watch how cancer deteriorates a body so rapidly, you want to help,” she said.

 

Roberts woke up from a dream and wrote down the words: hope for life. The words became Hope 4 L.Y.F.E. that means: Live Your Future Everyday.

 

“Something had been gnawing at me because I couldn’t save my dad since he was too far gone. But, now I do this because I don’t want to feel that guilt of what I could have done, but didn’t,” she said. “When you know better, you do better.”

 

As an independent business owner who pays for health care out of pocket, Roberts wanted to help save lives by taking the worrisome burden off of women who skip health care needs because of limited finances.

 

Roberts’ partnership with CHI has helped to provide mammograms for hundreds of women. The nonprofit health center’s radiology department offers a sliding fee scale for the uninsured. But, Hope 4 L.Y.F.E takes away any financial burden standing between some women and a mammogram.

 

“Women are the caretakers of the family,” said Brodes H. Hartley Jr., President and CEO of CHI. “Some women put their own health on the back burner and give priority to their loved ones. Hope 4 L.Y.F.E is a race for those women – to make sure that someone cares for them and gives them access to mammograms.”