Hadassah's Latest Achievements in Medicine and Helping At-Risk Youth

The Charlotte Jewish News, June/July 2023

By Aileen Greenberg-Kriner

Yvette Jacobson and Gina Robins, our chapter co-presidents, attended the Hadassah Southern Seaboard Regional Conference in Virginia Beach in late April. Southern Seaboard includes several North Carolina Hadassah chapters, and others in Virginia and West Virginia. While Hadassah Charlotte Metro is just one of the eleven chapters in the Southern Seaboard region and one of 700 U.S. chapters, we all have the same goal — fundraising for Hadassah’s many programs in the U.S. and Israel, including support for the Hadassah Medical Organization (HMO) in Jerusalem and Hadassah’s facilities for at-risk youth in Israel.

At the conference, the women participated in team-building exercises, leadership training, state-level advocacy training, and most importantly, learned what Hadassah’s latest successes are in the HMO and its Youth Aliyah Villages in Israel.

Hadassah Medical Organization

Hadassah hospitals treat about one million patients each year, regardless of race, religion, or nationality. HMO hospitals’ main areas of expertise include cancer, cardiac care, emergency medicine/trauma care, women’s health, personalized medicine/ genetics, and stem cell research/ neurology. Our internationally renowned hospitals in Israel, Hadassah Ein Kerem,and Hadassah Mt. Scopus, are leaders in health care and research.

Conference participants heard updates about recent, remarkable HMO achievements, including:

- Developing breast cancer treatment protocols that are used throughout the United States, including at Duke University Medical Center.

- Sending medics to southern Turkey as part of a 230-member Israeli medical aid delegation following the devastating earthquake in February.

- Administering the first in the world (!) outpatient CAR-T Cancer treatment which was developed at Hadassah to treat Multiple Myeloma, AL Amyloidosis, and other BCMA-positive malignancies (types of blood cancers).

- Developing Organoid treatment, the first of its kind in Israel, at Hadassah Ein Kerem. Organoids offer researchers the reality of developing personalized cancerous tumor treatments.

Hadassah’s Youth Aliyah Villages

Conference participants learned how Hadassah’s Youth Aliyah Villages, Meir Shfeyah and Neurim, bring at-risk children from diverse backgrounds to live and learn together. The student body includes Jews, Druse, Muslims, Christians, and immigrants from around the world, including refugees from the war in Ukraine.

Almost half a million children in Israel suffer from highrisk situations, including abuse, learning disabilities, or a lack of basic needs. Young immigrants and at-risk native Israelis receive a full spectrum of help at the Youth Villages — food, shelter, counseling, education, and other supportive services. They learn Hebrew, take other classes, and get the care and attention they need to become productive members of Israeli society. Since 1934, over 300,000 students from 80 countries have graduated from Youth Aliyah.

Hadassah’s fundraising efforts, mostly raised through our chapter events, continue to support the HMO’s world-class healthcare and research, as well as Hadassah’s Youth Aliyah Villages.

Help support Hadassah. Save the date for…

…a fun “Israel at 75” party on the afternoon of June 25. There will be Israeli learning, food, and song to celebrate Israel. See Hadassah Charlotte Metro website for details.

…our major “Celebrate the Tatas” Fundraiser for Breast Cancer. This is a two-part event. Painting Days are Monday and Tuesday, August 28-29 at Temple Beth El. Painting days honor those with breast cancer and those who have been touched by breast cancer. Sign up to get your tatas painted! Thursday, October 26, is our fundraising event with lunch at Maggiano’s, a live auction, wine pull, and more. Email celebratethetatas.hadassah@ gmail.com if you want to volunteer or need additional information.

Summer Reading and Refreshments

Beverly’s Book Nook will meet on Friday, June 16, at 1:30 p.m. to discuss Code Name Sapphire by Pam Jenoff. We will talk about Kantika by Elizabeth Grover at the July 21 meeting.

Hadassah BookTalk will Zoom on June 27 at 7 p.m. and talk about “The Matchmaker’s Gift” by Lynda Cohen Loigman. On July 25, we will discuss “Once We Were Home” by Jennifer Rosner.

Short Story Discussion Group will not meet in June. At the July 14 meeting, at 11:45 a.m., we will discuss the first story in the book “Frankly Feminist: Short Stories by Jewish Women,” edited by Susan Weidman-Schneider and Yona Zeldis McDonough.

Come to Hadassah Wine & Schmooze on Tuesdays, June 6 and August 1 at 7 p.m. at Vintner Wine Market in Arboretum. There will be no event in July.

Helpful Hadassah Info

The next Hadassah Charlotte Metro Board meetings are Mondays, June 19 and July 17, at 7 p.m. via Zoom.

For more information about Hadassah Charlotte Metro, membership, or our events, please check our website, www. hadassahcltevents.org, email HadassahCLT@gmail.com or call our general number, (980) 553-1880.

Follow us on Facebook (Hadassah CLT Metro), Instagram (Hadassah Charlotte Metro), and Twitter (@HadassahCLT).

Photo caption: Hadassah Hospital, Ein Kerem, Jerusalem