Rihanna Donates $1.75 Million to Barbados Hospital for Cancer Treatment in Honor of Her Grandmother "Dolly"

In memory of her late grandmother, pop superstar Rihanna is donating nearly $2 million to a hospital in her native homeland of Barbados.

Rihanna announced this week that she would be donating $1.75 million to the Queen Elizabeth Hospital, with the money earmarked for the hospital's radiotherapy department that will be renamed the Clara Braithwaite Centre for Oncology and Nuclear Medicine.

The wing will be named after the singer's grandmother, Clara "Dolly" Braithwaite, who died of cancer in June. Radiotherapy is the use of high energy rays to destroy cancer cells in cancer treatment. 

In a statement to E! News, Rihanna explained her reasons for making her donation to the hospital in the island nation where she was born.

"This was my way of giving back to Barbados, in a form of philanthropy, by assisting the QEH in its continued modernization program...I believe that this will have a huge impact on the people of Barbados. This was all done to save lives or at least extend them."

The five-time Grammy Award winner, who has sold more than 25 million albums worldwide, told Oprah Winfrey in August that her grandmother was one of her biggest influences.

"She was a well-rounded woman," Rihanna explained in an emotional interview. "She taught me a lot about forgiveness, loving my enemies, spirituality [and] strength as a woman."

In fact, Rihanna also inked a tattoo of her late grandmother's name across her chest after she died.