A Curtin University MBA student has been named WA Young Australian of the year for 2011 after founding MelanomaWA to support people who live with skin cancer. Graduate School of Business student Clinton Heal, 27, was diagnosed with Melanoma five years ago and has had more than 24 secondary tumours removed over the last four years.
Mr Heal found very little support or information was available in WA, so in 2008, he founded MelanomaWA to help other sufferers access the help they needed to cope with the cancer and improve their prognosis.
There was a particular lack of information on alternative and natural cancer therapies.
A volunteer speaker himself to schoolchildren and mine site workers, Mr Heal also brings in guest experts from a range of areas to talk to the support group he established.
Mr Heal has also organised Perth’s March for Melanoma and this year, the MBA graduate was appointed CEO of the Melanoma Cancer Support Association WA.
His WA award qualifies him as a finalist in the Young Australian of the Year Awards to be announced in Canberra on January 25, 2011.