After the death of her husband from pancreatic cancer 11 years ago, Pam Kosolofski has been doing something special to raise awareness of the cancer for the past 10 years. Called “Purple Pansies for Pancreatic Cancer,” Kosolofski takes orders for purple pansies and cash donations every spring to help find a cure.  

Kosolofski talks about how she got started doing the fundraiser. 

“I'm retired, I worked at the nursing home for 23 1/2 years and my husband passed away from pancreatic cancer 11 years ago at the end of July. And the next year, I found out they were doing pancreatic cancer purple pansies across Canada, and I don't know if it's being kept up so much across Canada, but we kept it going for the last 10 years, so we're doing good,” Kosolofski said.  

Kosolofski also talked about the importance of finding pancreatic cancer early. 

“I didn't even know there was such a thing as pancreatic cancer, and now it's out there, but it's still 50% will die within four months of diagnosis, so it's scary. The mortality rate is 92%, so we're trying to get it out there to get them diagnosed early. When identifying the symptoms: upset stomach, abdominal back pain, fatigue, depression, jaundice, and late diagnosis is the number one reason this cancer is so deadly. And not everybody can have surgery. They're working on research now and they're saying that sometimes the chemotherapy before and after the surgery to shrink tumors and kill cancer cells seems to be making its appearance. And that wasn't a possibility when my husband passed away from it,” Kosolofski added. 

Back to the “Purple Pansies for Pancreatic Cancer” fundraiser, Kosolofski said there are a group of women you can get a hold of. Included on this list is Vicki from the Oyen Greenhouses (403-664-3549), Lisa Watson from Elrose (306-962-7207), lwatson79@live.com, Danielle Helgason (306-831-8707) for Rosetown, Cora Knuttila (306-460-9047) for Eatonia, and Lee in Eston (306-402-7170, 306-962-3221). 

You can also e-transfer to kosog@sasktel.net. 

Pickup dates vary, but in Eston they will be available at DT’s parking lot on May 26 at 2:00 pm. In Kindersley at the Western Pizza parking lot on May 26 at 11:30 am. Pickup will be on May 27 in Elrose. Kosolofski then talked about other ways people can donate. 

“You can do it online as far as that goes to pancreatic Cancer Canada, and you can put it in memory of somebody. That's what I did for years. And also, if they just want to give donations to either one of us, that's doing the Pansies fundraiser, they do that as well. Instead of taking the pansies, they give a donation. We just take e-transfers and checks and they can contact their area person and see how they want to do it. We would like the payment ahead of time. It worked so well, that's the only thing that came out of COVID that was good, everybody had paid up, we didn't have to deal with money or anything on the day so, anytime in the next week or so would be great, they can get ahold of us,” Kosolofski said. 

She then went into details about how much work she does to get things ready for the fundraiser.  

“I pick up the pansies up in Oyen, deliver it to Kindersley. Rosetown meets me there, I bring the rest of mine to Eston, Eatonia meets me in Oyen, they get theirs that day. Then the next day I'm going to be driving over to Elrose and I have a friend from Saskatoon that meets me in Rosetown. She sells them in Saskatoon so, I meet with her, have lunch and come back, and go out and deliver on Saturday, and then go out to Airdrie so, it's a busy three days,” Kosolofski added.  

There is still plenty of time to head out and get some “Purple Pansies for Pancreatic Cancer,” and cash donations continue to be always welcome.