Patrick Dempsey might be known to fans by his rakish two-word pseudonym – Dr. McDreamy – from the hit show “Grey’s Anatomy,” but this Buckfield-boy-turned-movie-star is proving his talent in health care is more than just having a pretty face for the cameras.

In a ceremony Monday, Dempsey unveiled the “Patrick Dempsey Center for Cancer Hope & Healing” at Central Maine Medical Center, and donated $250,000 to spark its fundraising effort. The center opens on March 31.

One wonders where Mainers stricken with cancer would turn without such generous philanthropy, from donors both in the spotlight, like Dempsey, or more comfortable behind-the-scenes, like the late Harold Alfond.

In 2007, the $42 million Alfond Cancer Care Center opened at MaineGeneral Hospital in Augusta. Alfond donated $7 million for the hospital that now bears his name.

These gifts ensure cancer sufferers in Maine don’t have to wonder, while also reflecting the shift in oncological thinking regarding the disease. No longer is cancer a stigma, or a sentence; instead, living well with cancer is now not only a possibility, but the definite probability.

American Cancer Society data indicates the national survival rate of patients diagnosed with cancer rose to 66 percent by 1995, after spending the bulk of the previous two decades mired as a 50-50 proposition. Since the early 1990s through 2004, the society has estimated, more than 534,000 cancer deaths have been avoided.

In Maine, cancer deaths decreased from 2000-2004, according to the National Cancer Institute. The gain was slight – 1.3 percent – but within this were stark improvements in the survival rates for certain cancers, such as thyroid, ovarian, stomach, colon and prostate cancers.

Deaths from these cancers fell between 3.5 and 11.5 percent; by comparison, the greatest percentage increase in certain cancer deaths were both less than 4 percent.

Numbers don’t tell the whole story, however. Patients do. Dempsey’s mother, Amanda, has survived two bouts with ovarian cancer and is again in remission. Alfond himself battled and survived with cancer for 17 years, before passing at age 93 last year.

There are countless high-profile examples – cyclist Lance Armstrong and Elizabeth Edwards, wife of former presidential candidate John Edwards are examples – whose strength and determination in the face of cancer diagnoses have become symbols of hope.

Nobody should say living with cancer should be easy. There is no cure, and the treatments can be difficult on the patient’s body, and their psyche. Although oncology has come quite far, there’s still breakthroughs that must be made.

But, as Time Magazine observed in profiling Edwards, the medical progress has made today perhaps the best time to live with the disease.

The generosity of benefactors like McDreamy, Alfond and many others makes this certainly true for Maine.