18
Years of help
100%
To patients
3
Ways we help
Home / About
In memory of Myrtle Lee Carter
We started where a mother left off.
MLC Cancer Foundation carries the name, and the intent, of Myrtle Lee Carter. Today that means three things: helping families lower their cancer risk, catch it early, and get practical help with the bills when a diagnosis comes. Any type of cancer, any stage.
Our mission
Prevention first. Help when it counts.
MLC Cancer Foundation is a non-profit, tax-exempt organization working on three fronts: helping people lower their cancer risk, catching cancer early, and covering the costs that come with a diagnosis. We serve patients facing any type of cancer, at any stage, anywhere in the United States.
Our home is Martinsville, Virginia, the area with the highest cancer rate in the state. That's why we teach as much as we give: families learn about genetic mutations and why getting tested matters.
1
Prevention
Nutrition and lifestyle programs, cooking demos and take-home recipes that make cancer-smart living practical, so families can lower their risk before cancer starts.
2
Early detection
Genetic-risk education, family health history tools and the CANversational Kit, built with the UVA Comprehensive Cancer Center, help people know their risk and act early. Free screenings at A Pink Event.
3
Financial assistance
When a diagnosis comes, any type and any stage, we help cover co-pays, childcare, groceries and other costs. One short application, usually answered within a week.
What we do
Three ways we fight cancer.
Myrtle Lee Carter
The name
A woman who gave, right to the end.
Myrtle Lee Carter spent her life looking after her neighbors — a plate of food here, a ride to an appointment there. When cancer took her in 2007, her family knew the truest tribute wouldn't be a plaque. It would be more of what she already did.
So the foundation took her initials and her instinct: notice who's struggling, and help them today. Every grant we pay is a small continuation of the way she moved through the world.
Don't wait to be asked. If you can help, help now.
Founder
Pat Via turned grief into a plan.
Around a year or so after losing her mother, Pat received her own diagnosis. She knew firsthand how fast the bills stack up beside the fear — and how little of that the average family is ready for.
In 2008 she founded MLC to close that exact gap. Eighteen years and hundreds of families later, Pat is still standing, and still signing off on the help herself. This has never been a big, distant charity. It's a neighbor with a checkbook and a phone.
Pat Via
Pat Via
Co-Founder & CEO
Telesa Via
Co-Founder
Watch our story
About The MLC Cancer Foundation: a short video introduction to who we are and the families we serve.
Meet the team
The family behind the foundation.
1
Help should be fast.
A diagnosis doesn't schedule itself. We answer applications within a week — often the same day — because rent and chemo don't wait.
2
Every dollar is patient money.
100% of donations go straight to patient assistance. Grants and volunteers cover our overhead, so your gift pays a real bill.
3
Every cancer, one door.
Whatever the diagnosis, every patient walks through the same door — no one is turned away for the type of cancer they have.
What we believe
Three convictions that shape every grant.
2007
Myrtle Lee Carter passes.
The loss that started everything.
2008
MLC Cancer Foundation is founded.
Pat Via begins in Martinsville, VA.
2009
First A Pink Event.
The annual nutrition and cancer prevention symposium.
2016
The mission widens.
Help for every kind of cancer.
2021
Regional referral network.
Clinics send patients straight to us.
2026
18th A Pink Event.
Still one family at a time.
Eighteen years
A quiet mission, one year at a time.
Martinsville Henry County Coalition for Health and Wellness
Inova
Invitae
Our partners
Working alongside us.
