Corey Ribotsky Info

Sometimes, all it takes is one person and an idea. In early 1988, Bruce Cleland of Towson, Maryland gathered friends together to train for the New York City marathon – and to do so while raising funds for blood cancer research. His daughter, who was five at the time, was battling leukemia. Cleland and his friends ended up donating $320,000 that year to the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society, where so many donors, like Corey Ribotsky, help to make a difference.

And with ihs efforts, the Team In Training program was born. LLS asked Cleland to replicate the idea that he had in 1988 in other locations, and he slowly created the Team In Training model.

Now, Georgia Cleland, that little girl who was given a 55% chance of survival, just finished her first half-marathon with Team In Training. And, thanks to her father’s idea, the Team In Training program has reached over half a million people who have trained in the last 23 years and has raised more than $1.2 billion in research.

Get ready for this month’s important awareness month for leukemia and lymphoma.  September is the annual month marking leukemia, lymphoma and myeloma awareness.  There have been significant strides in the treatment of patients with blood cancers in the last few years.  Much of this work has been supported by the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society (LLS) where Corey Ribotsky volunteers.  The organization was founded in 1949.

According to survivor Nikki Henshaw, the work of the LLS is only to be commended. She stated quite clearly, “I have personally seen the progress in cure rates and treatments from when I experienced leukemia in 1994.These changes have dramatically improved the quality of life for those who are battling cancer.”

Indeed, the statistics speak for themselves.  In the last four decades, there has been an 87 percent increase in the survival rate of children who contract acute lymphocytic leukemia, from 3 percent to 90 percent.  As well, since the 1960s, there has been a doubling in the survival rate of Hodgkin lymphoma patient survival.

Still there is much work to be done and the LLS requires substantial finances and volunteers to keep up with its good work.

In recent news with the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society, where Corey Ribotsky and the NIR Group are donors, World Cup soccer hero Landon Donovan launched a TEN day challenge.  The purpose of the challenge was to help cure cancer through donations.  All people had to do was text “GOAL” to 90999 to donate ten dollars to help children through the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society.

As Donovan explained, “I’ve always been focused on “The Goal”. That’s why I’ve joined The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society to BrighTEN the Future with a TEN day challenge to help raise money to conquer childhood cancer.”

His TEN day challenge ran from August 16-26, 2010.