By Nathan Ham
For seven years now, Doc McCoy and Doc’s Rocks Gem Mine has been doing their best to make an impact on the lives of cancer patients in the High Country.
Doc’s Rocks Gem Mine presented a check to the Seby B. Jones Regional Cancer Center on Monday morning. The total amount raised was $22,611.
McCoy says he does this each year because cancer has had such a devastating impact on so many families, including his own.
“I just lost my brother to lung cancer, my youngest sister to breast cancer. My oldest sister is a breast cancer survivor and my mom is a survivor so this is how we fight it,” McCoy said.
Each year, Doc’s Rocks Gem Mine hosts a “Mining For a Purpose” day where the money raised goes to the cancer fund.
“We donate 100 percent of what we bring in so the entire day is volunteer hours,” said McCoy.
After seven years of donations, Doc’s Rocks Gem Mine has donated a total of $96,380 to help people improve their quality of life as they battle cancer.
“This money goes to our Cancer Patient Emergency Fund so we’re then able to provide dollars to folks to be able to have gas cards to get to their treatments, it can pay for groceries, utility bills, heating bills for the winter even medication and those sorts of things, so to have the ability to have some funds available for our folks is amazing,” said Kim Bianca of Appalachian Regional Healthcare System.
Bianca says that community support like this makes it possible to help out patients with more than just medical services.
“This takes care of our community so that’s why it chokes us up and makes us feel so grateful because Doc’s dedication to this and to our community and how he’s out there helping us, he’s part of our cancer resource alliance, that’s our group of volunteers that are out in the community promoting our cancer center and promoting care for patients so it’s fantastic,” said Bianca.
To learn more about Mining For a Purpose or to make a donation, visit docsrocks.org. To learn more about how to help the Seby B. Jones Regional Cancer Center, contact Brian Whitfield, the Director of Development for the Appalachian Regional Healthcare Foundation at 828-262-9105 or by email at bwhitfield@apprhs.org.
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