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[Sponsored Report] AmorePacific offers a hand to cancer patients

Published: 19 Oct. 2015, 22:32

Amore counselors from the door-to-door sales department will be volunteering for the Makeup Your Life campaign. [AMOREPACIFIC]

Since 2008, AmorePacific has been offering its expertise in beauty, skin care and hairstyling to female cancer patients who are experiencing dramatic changes to their appearance during their medical treatments.

Held twice a year, the AmorePacific Makeup Your Life event kicked off Sept. 16 at Seoul National University and will take place until Nov. 13.

The campaign is run by a volunteer team composed largely of “Amore counselors” and beauty specialists from the door-to-door sales department. As of last year, 9,221 female cancer patients and 2,904 Amore counselors have participated in the campaign.

Volunteers apply makeup to participants as a central part of the program [AMOREPACIFIC]

Makeup Your Life will be held in 20 hospitals across the country, with 810 patients being assisted by 324 Amore counselors. Any woman who has undergone surgery related to cancer within the last two years and is currently being treated with radiation or chemotherapy can register. Every participant will be provided with a brochure and a “Makeup Your Life Kit” that includes makeup from the brand HERA, as well as skin care products by Primera.

During the event, AmorePacific’s beauty specialists and volunteers will provide tips related to makeup and skin care, and will also advise on how to do things like self-diagnose basic skin conditions. In some hospitals, a public figure or an Amore counselor who is also a cancer survivor will share their story to encourage participants currently fighting the disease. Meanwhile, for patients who cannot attend the actual event due to difficulty walking or lack of time, counselors will be available to personally visit homes or hospital rooms.

The campaign’s intent is to help female cancer patients overcome the depression that often follows cancer treatments and encourage them with a positive attitude towards life and beauty.

A research paper published last February has proven the medical effectiveness that the Makeup Your Life campaign has on cancer patients. Dr. Kim Sung-Won, a breast cancer specialist at Daelim Sungmo Hospital, studied participants in the Makeup Your Life campaign and discovered that they saw significant drops in the indices that measure negativity and unhappiness. Published in the renowned “European Journal of Cancer Care,” this was the first research conducted in Asia to prove the actual outcome of makeup training sessions for breast cancer patients.

As the cancer survival rate increases with the development of medical technology, attending to the psychological damage caused by the difficulty of cancer treatment is becoming increasingly critical. Although many cancer patients suffer from severe stress during therapy, the reality is that the number of programs is simply insufficient to meet rising demand. However, Dr. Kim’s research based on the Makeup Your Life campaign proves that makeup sessions do have a positive effect on the psychology of cancer patients, suggesting the importance of further developing new ways to help cancer patients not only through medical treatment, but also through cultural and social programs.

For this research, the psychological state of 60 patients who went through breast cancer surgery was measured before and after the makeup training session. The study showed that the sessions had a significant influence on improving patients’ control of negativity and behavior patterns evoked by stress from medical treatment. After a single session, the patients’ stress index dropped by 17 percent and the degree of evasive response towards cancer fell by 12 percent. Confidence in appearance, a stronger will to endure treatment and satisfaction in marriages also showed improvements.

“The fact that a single training session evokes such positive outcomes sends a hopeful message for us, the medical team that interacts with these patients everyday” said Dr. Kim Sung-won. “If we continue to expand this campaign to deal with more themes such as developing self-esteem, it will greatly help patients overcome their illness.”

The Makeup Your Life campaign is just one of many campaigns AmorePacific has prepared for this year’s second half. Collaboration projects with Kukka, an Internet-based flower subscription brand, and Coloz, a community that helps people choose the colors that best fit their personalities, are also in the works. Cultural sessions, such as practicing tea ceremonies, flower art and learning how to select personal colors, will improve their mindset, providing a broad range of experiences to improve their beauty from the inside out.

“Amore counselors have been working to spread the value of beauty into our society since 1964, when we first started door-to-door sales” said Ryu Je-chun, AmorePacific’s vice president. “Through Makeup Your Life, we intend to send our message of hope to the patients that one day, their hard work will pay off, and their beauty and vitality will come back to them.”

For further information about the campaign, call the 2015 AmorePacific Makeup Your Life secretariat office at 02-318-8673 or email [email protected].