Cancer survivor, donors fulfil dream of building medical clinic in Guatemala

The donors: Matthew Boroditsky, Mario Lemieux, Children’s Wish Foundation of Canada

The gift: Raising $100,000

The cause: To build a medical clinic in Guatemala

When Matthew Boroditsky was diagnosed with Hodgkin lymphoma in Grade 12, he was granted a wish from the Children’s Wish Foundation of Canada.

The foundation offers dream adventures for seriously ill children, but Mr. Boroditsky didn’t want to go on an extravagant trip or spend time with a celebrity. Instead he wanted to build a health clinic in an impoverished town in Guatemala. He’d been to the country a year earlier to help build a playground in Chivarabal while on a class trip with his high school, Vancouver’s St. George’s School. The area had no medical facilities, which is why Mr. Boroditsky chose it for his wish.

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The foundation agreed, and in 2013 it kicked in $7,500 to help him launch a fundraising campaign for the project. Over the next four years Mr. Boroditsky raised close to $100,000, with help from hockey great Mario Lemieux, who was diagnosed with Hodgkin lymphoma in the early 1990s. Mr. Lemieux offered Mr. Boroditsky some signed jerseys to auction. The money was enough for a multipurpose clinic which opened last August and serves 1,000 people.

Mr. Boroditsky’s cancer is in remission, and he’s now 21 and studying medicine at the University of British Columbia. “It’s really been a surreal experience,” he said from his home in Vancouver. “Just to think about how an idea that I thought about on my hospital bed translated into something tangible that will affect the lives of so many, and myself, I thought it was just a really cool circle.”