How Local Partnerships Are Expanding Access to Breast Health Services
Submitted by Ft. Jesse Imaging & Gale Center for Women
At its heart, healthcare is about more than technology, appointments, and procedures. Healthcare is truly about people. Neighbors helping neighbors, communities rallying around a cause, and ensuring that every single person has access to the care they need, regardless of circumstance. That spirit of compassion and connection has guided the work of Ft. Jesse Imaging & Gale Keeran Center for Women for many years, particularly through two beloved community fundraising events: Breast in Show, the annual decorated bra auction; and Brews for a Cause, a celebration that brings together local businesses, organizations, and residents in support of breast health.
What began as a creative way to raise funds for free mammograms has grown into something much larger: a community-driven movement that has expanded access to lifesaving breast health services throughout McLean County and beyond.
A Creative Idea with a Powerful Purpose
Early detection remains one of the most important tools in the fight against breast cancer. Regular screening mammograms save lives by identifying breast cancer in its earliest and most treatable stages. For many individuals, barriers such as cost, lack of insurance, or limited access to healthcare can delay or prevent screening.
Recognizing this need, Ft. Jesse Imaging & Gale Keeran Center for Women partnered with community organizations to create opportunities to provide free mammograms for local patients. From the beginning, proceeds from Breast in Show and, later, Brews for a Cause were directed toward patients served by the Community Health Care Clinic (CHCC), McLean County’s free and charitable clinic. Over time, Chestnut Family Health patients were also included in the free mammogram program. And truly, if any patient calls in without insurance or a financial concern, these funds answer that need.
For years, these fundraising efforts helped ensure that uninsured and underinsured individuals could receive breast cancer screenings they might otherwise have gone without. Every decorated bra auctioned, every raffle ticket purchased, and every business partnership directly contributed to providing essential healthcare to members of our community.
What made these efforts especially meaningful was that the impact remained local. Funds raised here stayed here. Our commitment has always been in supporting our neighbors, friends, coworkers, and family members who needed care.
The Power of Community Partnerships
Breast in Show has become one of the area’s most recognizable and inspiring events. Local businesses, organizations, and individuals transform ordinary bras into extraordinary works of art, each one telling a story of hope, resilience, humor, remembrance, or celebration. The creativity on display is remarkable, but the true beauty of the event lies in its purpose.
The decorated bras serve as a visible reminder that breast cancer touches every community and that everyone has a role to play in supporting those affected. Participants often create pieces in honor of loved ones, in memory of those lost, or as a celebration of survivorship. The result is more than a fundraiser — it is a shared expression of compassion.
Brews for a Cause has similarly become a favorite community gathering, bringing people together in a relaxed and engaging atmosphere to support breast health initiatives. Keg Grove Brewing has been an incredible partner in making the event a success. Their commitment to #CommunityFirst is evident in the way they welcome community causes and generously share their space to help bring them to life. Their willingness to partner, make the process easy, and create an environment where both the cause and the brewery can thrive is a true reflection of what community partnership can look like. Alongside local businesses, sponsors, volunteers, and attendees, Keg Grove helps demonstrate how coming together around a shared purpose can make a meaningful difference.
These events demonstrate that philanthropy does not have to be grand to be impactful. A raffle ticket purchased, a sponsorship offered, a volunteer hour donated, or a bid placed during an auction all become part of a larger story — one in which healthcare access is strengthened through collective generosity.
Growing to Meet Community Needs
As support for these programs has grown, so too has their impact.
The success of Breast in Show and Brews for a Cause has enabled Ft. Jesse Imaging & Gale Keeran Center for Women to continue supporting Community Health Care Clinic while also expanding breast health services available to the broader community. What once began primarily as funding for screening mammograms has evolved into a more comprehensive approach to supporting patients throughout their breast health journey.
This growth reflects an important understanding: Breast health needs do not end with a mammogram.
A screening can sometimes lead to additional imaging or diagnostic services, making access to timely breast health care especially important. Community support can help remove financial barriers to these essential screening and diagnostic services, ensuring that more people in our community have access to the care they need when they need it. As this work has grown, so too have opportunities to connect individuals with other community resources that address needs beyond screening and diagnosis.
By listening to patients and identifying unmet needs, Ft. Jesse Imaging has been able to continually adapt these fundraising efforts to provide meaningful support where it is needed most.
Introducing the Bounce Back Closet
In 2026, another important chapter begins.
A portion of funds raised through Breast in Show and Brews for a Cause will now directly support the newly established Bounce Back Closet, a project of Fittingly You Bra Boutique.
The Bounce Back Closet was created to provide women recovering from breast surgery with access to essential post-surgical items, including prosthetic bras, breast forms, and specialized garments designed for individuals following mastectomy or lumpectomy procedures.
For many women, these items are not simply products — they are tools that support healing, comfort, confidence, and dignity during a difficult time. Yet these garments and prosthetics can also represent a significant financial burden, especially for those facing insurance limitations or other economic challenges.
The Bounce Back Closet is working to remove these barriers by ensuring that women have access to the support they need as they navigate recovery.
This new partnership recognizes an important truth: Caring for patients means supporting the whole person — not only during diagnosis and treatment, but throughout recovery and beyond.
By extending support to the Bounce Back Closet, the community’s generosity will now help women at an additional stage of their breast health journey, providing practical resources alongside compassion and encouragement.
More Than Fundraising
Events like Breast in Show and Brews for a Cause are certainly fundraisers, but they are also much more.
They create awareness about the importance of breast cancer screening. They encourage conversations about prevention and early detection. They celebrate survivors, honor those who have faced cancer, and provide hope to individuals currently navigating treatment.
Perhaps most importantly, they remind us that healthcare is a shared responsibility.
Community health is strongest when healthcare providers, nonprofit organizations, local businesses, volunteers, and residents work together toward common goals. The partnerships that have developed through these events demonstrate what is possible when people unite around a cause greater than themselves.
Each mammogram provided, each patient supported, and each recovery aided through programs like the Bounce Back Closet is a direct reflection of a community that cares deeply for one another.
Looking Ahead
As Ft. Jesse Imaging & Gale Keeran Center for Women looks to the future, the mission remains unchanged: providing exceptional care while expanding access to breast health services for all who need them.
The continued success of Breast in Show and Brews for a Cause reflects the incredible generosity of our community and the shared belief that no one should face barriers to breast health care.
Every participant, sponsor, volunteer, artist, and attendee plays an important role in this story. Together, they have helped provide free mammograms, strengthened partnerships with Community Health Care Clinic, Chestnut Family Health, and now will help support women through recovery with the Bounce Back Closet.
This is what community looks like.
It is creativity with purpose. Generosity in action. Neighbors helping neighbors.
And it is proof that when a community comes together around compassion and care, the impact can be felt for years to come.
Ft. Jesse Imaging & Gale Keeran Center for women, located at 2200 Ft Jesse Rd. in Normal, fulfills the community’s diagnostic imaging needs, in a calm outpatient setting, with outpatient rates. You may call them at 309-454-5552, visit them on Facebook at www.facebook.com/FtJesseImaging, or online at www.ftjesse.com.
