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Woman of the Year: Lisa Ciampa helps cancer patients

She established the Luna Cares fund in honor of her late mother.

HANDOUT Lisa Ciampa

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By Meagan Engle, Staff Writer Updated 1:11 PM Friday, December 30, 2011

Lisa Ciampa knows the battle her mother faced while fighting cancer. The disease took not just a physical toll, but at times left her mother questioning whether to continue treatments knowing her husband would continue to pay the medical bills long after she passed away.

Ciampa does not want other women to face that same dilemma. In 2010, she established the Luna Cares Fund in honor of her mother, Sara Davis Emery, who died at the age of 40.

This year, Ciampa helped 47 women in Butler County pay their medical bills – for treatments, doctor visits, hospital stays, surgeries, prosthetic wigs, counseling, prescriptions and more.

And Ciampa has an even higher goal: Help 200 women battling cancer pay their medical bills by the end of 2012.

“She is truly and honestly and sincerely wanting to help people with no expectation of something in return,” said friend Lisa Elliott.

Ciampa, owner of the Luna Blu Salon in Stewart Square, held a Halloween family event this year to raise money for the fund, which is with the Oxford Community Foundation. She also established Luna Cares as a 501c3 nonprofit.

The mother of four meets women who have lost their hair, including facial hair, after hours at her salon to demonstrate how to apply their eye makeup to look natural, in spite of having no eyebrows or eyelashes left, said friend Lyn Schloemer.

She donates baskets with lotion and other spa items to women undergoing chemotherapy and helps them purchase natural looking wigs.

Ciampa also hosts women in her home once a month to help a breast cancer patient make Raggedy Ann dolls to sell, Schloemer said.

“As compassionate as Lisa is, she quietly and anonymously does so much behind the scenes no one even knows about,” Schloemer said.

On top of her fund, Ciampa is also involved in the Oxford Chamber of Commerce and Oxford Visitors and Convention Bureau.

“She puts in so much effort into everything she does,” Elliott said. “She’s unstoppable.”

“I admire her,” Schloemer said. “I admire her strength and her courage, but I think most of all I admire her humility. She’s just doing this for other people and looking for nothing in return.”

Ciampa is already planning a fundraiser in 2012, which will be a Valentine’s Day dinner.

For more information on the Luna Cares fund, go online to LunaCares.com.

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