Healthcare was not always within her reach.

She was our grandmother, and long before Broches for a Cause existed, she showed us what it meant to carry light through circumstances that offered very little of it.

Maria Dolores lived with renal failure and required dialysis three times a week. Without health insurance, receiving that care consistently was extraordinarily difficult. At times, the emergency room became the only option. Her family would wait beside her for as long as 48 hours for treatment.

They could make that journey once a week. She needed it three times.

Medication brought another uncertainty. There were times her family simply could not afford what she needed, leaving them to search for other ways to obtain it. During one emergency room visit, a doctor suggested that Maria Dolores return to her country, expressing concern that her continued use of emergency services was taking resources from citizens.

For her family, the message was difficult to forget: her circumstances did not only shape her access to care. At times, they seemed to shape the compassion she received from those entrusted with helping save her life.

And still, Maria Dolores remained remarkably full of joy. She smiled easily, loved deeply, and carried a warmth that hardship never seemed able to take from her. There was something rare about the way she saw people—as though she could look beyond what was visible and recognize the person underneath it all.

She passed away in 2016.

At the time, there was no Broches for a Cause. There was no thought that one day a broche would carry her name.

Today, one does.

Maria Dolores was created in her memory and in support of Volunteers in Medicine of Southern Nevada, whose work helps bring healthcare within reach for people who might otherwise go without it.

The care once beyond her reach can now be brought closer to someone else.