Two families of children receiving cancer treatment at Shands at UF will soon receive a helping hand.
The 5th annual Lance Dalton Memorial Silent Auction, hosted by the UF chapter of Friends for Life of America, is being held to assist deserving families in paying their medical bills, said Rachel Cannon, the co-chair of the event and a child-education junior at UF.
This year's funds will be given to two families, one with a 3-year-old boy with leukemia and the other with a 16-year-old girl with Hodgkin's lymphoma, Cannon said.
Friends for Life of America would not release any more information about the patients or their families for legal reasons, she said.
Online bidding began Monday and will end Tuesday at 6 p.m.
Bidding will continue live on Wednesday from 10 a.m. until 3 p.m. on the Reitz Union Colonnade, she said.
Last year, the event raised about ,3,000, and this year's goal is ,5,000, she said.
It cost families about ,150,000 per leukemia treatment and the amount of treatments varies depending on the case, Cannon said.
Cannon said the items up for bid include a Kaplan course worth ,1,500 and Disney park passes worth more than ,100.
"The items are things that you're buying for yourself," she said. "But at the same time, you're giving to other people."
