By BECKY KISER
Hays Post

Some of the golfers turned out purely for fun; others teed it up because their lives have been touched by cancer.

Friday’s 18th annual “Drive FORE Cancer” golf tournament at the Fort Hays Municipal Golf Course was a fundraiser for the Ellis County Relay for Life (RFL).

RFL volunteer Mary Ann Randa confessed she is “not a golfer,” but she’s been at the event–coordinated by Hays Eagle Radio–the past 16 years. According to Randa, 33 percent of the funds raised in RFL events are used by the American Cancer Society for cancer research.

Cancer has definitely touched her life.

Randa’s mother died of colon cancer. Her brother Bob Kuhn, a popular Hays High School wrestling coach and teacher, died of kidney cancer in 2008 at the age of 57. She has a couple of friends and co-workers who are currently undergoing cancer treatment.

“Cancer is no longer an automatic terminal illness because of the research and treatments that are now available,” Randa said.

One example of that progress, funded in part by the American Cancer Society, is stem cell transplants.

“My brother Bob battled cancer for 10 years.  He was lucky that one of my other brothers was an exact match for a donor stem cell transplant.  Some of the stem cell treatments my friends are having to deal with–now they are able to harvest and use their own stem cells.  Some of the things that Bob endured, they’re not having to deal with.  Your side effects are drastically reduced and your treatment is not nearly as harsh as what it used to be.  So, their prognosis is even better.”

Thirty-one teams participated in yesterday’s Drive FORE Cancer golf tourney.

The annual Ellis County Relay for Life will be held Sat., Oct. 22, 2016, from 12 to 6 p.m. in the Fort Hays State University Gross Memorial Coliseum.

A date and location has yet to be determined for the RFL Survivor Supper for cancer patients and their care givers.