About this user
The Kevin A Przybyl, Breathe Easy Foundation is coming soon, January 2010 !!
This foundation has been created by Kevin Przybyl, a Cystic Fibrosis patient that has battled this disease for his entire life of 30 years. The goal is to assist individuals with Cystic Fibrosis of all ages, throughout the United States.
Cystic fibrosis is an inherited chronic disease that affects the lungs and digestive system of about 30,000 children and adults in the United States (70,000 worldwide). A defective gene and its protein product cause the body to produce unusually thick, sticky mucus that:
1. clogs the lungs and leads to life-threatening lung infections; and
2. obstructs the pancreas and stops natural enzymes from helping the body break down and absorb food.
In the 1950s, few children with cystic fibrosis lived to attend elementary school. Today, advances in research and medical treatments have further enhanced and extended life for children and adults with CF. Many people with the disease can now expect to live into their 30s, 40s and beyond.
People are donating millions of dollars for research, which is great. This foundation will be focusing on assisting patients cope with having increased costs.
Cystic Fibrosis is very costly to treat, many patients may take as upwards of 20 medications per day. Many of these medications are classified by insurance companies as Specialty meds which lead to higher co-pays, meaning patients spend several hundred dollars a month just on meds.
Nutrition, because our bodies have poor absorption and more calories are burned off from coughing and fighting off infections, CF patients require more nutrition each day. The added cost of additional groceries each month also puts a strain on the budget.
Many CF patients see several specialists every few months at least, so again add costs for travel and doctor co-pays.
Now that we find ourselves living longer because of all these wonderful new treatments and meds, we have found out how difficult it is to pay for all of it. I myself have a wife and son, something unimaginable 20 or 30 years ago, but having to pay for a family on top of paying nearly $15,000 a year to stay healthy has become very difficult. There are CF patients that pay much more because they can not work full time, or dont have health insurance, and cant receive assistance from the state they live in. They may make to much or like the majority of states, finacial assistance programs are not even available for CF patients. Those that have state funded programs are seeing smaller budgets because of the economic crisis we are in.
Thats where this foundation comes in. We plan to raise money to assist CF patients pay for meds, treatments, doctors visits, and nutrition. Whether we are helping pay for co-pays for doctors visits and medications, or giving out gas cards so patients can get to doctors appointments, or gift cards for groceries. We will help CF patients Breathe Easy and allow them to focus efforts on staying alive and well with out worrying about how they are going to pay for it.
Our website Breatheasy.org will be running soon so continue to check out this site and youtube for ways that you can help make this foundation a success !!
Age
33
Country
United States
BreatheEasyUSA
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