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A Season For Giving – Part 4 – A 2nd Chance At Life

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Help us greet the new year with a 2nd chance at life!

With your financial contribution, you are supporting us in fulfilling our mission to save more lives…to give more patients that 2nd chance at life. Funds that we raise help us recruit potential bone marrow donors and add them to the Be The Match donor registry.

donate and make a difference

Please consider making a tax deductible donation to the Icla da Silva Foundation and help us host more drives, recruit more donors, and aid more families in need.

 

Specifically, we need to add more potential life savers who are ethnically diverse. All minority segments are under represented and those patients are much less likely to find a matching donor.

With your help we can change this unfortunate fact.

 

 

We need to recruit more people like Michael Powell, who registered through Icla da Silva in 2007. He received the call that he was a match, not once, but twice. He generously donated his stem cells in 2013, and then he gave his life saving bone marrow in 2017.

His bone marrow was successfully transplanted into Aunesti Sullivan, and she began her 2nd chance at life on June 2, 2017 at the age of 12. She is doing great and living the active life of a young teenager – thanks to Michael.

Please help us recruit more people like Michael and add more hope for the 14,000 patients who are in need each year. Even a small financial donation will help us give more patients like Aunesti a 2nd chance at life.

make a financial donation

If you missed part 1part 2, or part 3 of this 4 part series, you can read them by clicking the links.

Icla da Silva is a 501(c)3 organization and your donation is tax deductible.

Thank you for your support!

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A Season For Giving – Part 3 – Keeping Hope Alive

KEEPING HOPE ALIVE!

This Holiday season we are sharing four inspiring stories from our patients and friends. We hope that these stories move you and incite you to make a donation.

With donations from people like you, Icla da Silva is able to manage a small patient support program. The program provides aid to patients in need.

Our goal is to Keep the Hope Alive for as many patients as possible. Whether they are searching for a match, or working through treatment, we do our best to provide emotional, logistical, and as often as we can, financial support.

Our budget is small, but we are always available with a supportive ear and a kind word.  We help with logistics by making referrals regarding transplant centers, and recommendations for second opinions and clinical trials.  When we can afford it, we try to assist financially with HLA typing and sometimes, transportation, lodging or meals. This year, we were able to help more than 200 families.  Whether that was 2 nights at a Holiday Inn, or a gas card to get to a treatment center, we support the patients we work with as best we can.

We would love to be able to help more patients, but we can’t do it without you.  Please consider a donation and help us Keep Hope Alive.

make A donation

You may remember Ne’Mya Sullivan from last year.

Mya was blessed to receive a life-saving stem cell transplant from her brother. With so many weeks in the hospital, both before and after her transplant, Mya’s mom was forced to quit work; despite their growing list of bills and expenses. Thanks to people like you, we were fortunate enough to be able to assist the family with a small grant. We are grateful that we were able to Keep the Hope Alive because of donations from our supporters.

Thank you to amazing people who supported us through our journey and continue to check in. We love you all…thank you most to the Icla da Silva Foundation. You are all so amazing; more than supporters, more like family. Thank you for everything.” -Nekisha Banks Sullivan

One year post transplant and Ne’Mya is doing great. She is in the 5th grade and has joined the cheerleading team. She is grateful for a daily routine without meds, and the opportunity to enjoy her family without restriction. Go Mya!

A single donation can make such a profound impact on a patient’s family. Will you help us continue to Keep Hope Alive? We want every family to get the support that they need in the New Year.

Help us help them.

KEEP THE HOPE ALIVE

If you missed part 1, or part 2 of our 4 part series, you can read them by clicking the links.

Icla da Silva is a 501(c)3 organization and your donation is tax deductible.

Thank you.

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A Season For Giving – Part 2 – The Gift of Hope

SEASONS GREETINGS!

This Holiday season we are sharing four inspiring stories from our patients and friends. We hope that these stories move you and incite you to make a donation.

All throughout the year, the Icla da Silva Foundation strives to give more patients and their families the Gift of Hope.

During the Holiday Season, the Season for Giving, we ask for your help. The funds that are donated go towards adding more potential life savers to the Be The Match bone marrow registry.

make your donation

Too many patients are searching for a matching stem cell or bone marrow donor without success.

Veronica Depauli is one of those patients. Veronica is searching for her match.

She has a very rare disease called ADO II. It is a genetic disorder which causes increased bone density and abnormal bone growth. Without a matching donor, her condition can lead to facial paralysis, blindness and death. Veronica’s family has been searching for a bone marrow match for over two years, and we have been supporting them in their search.

Although her condition gets more complex with each day, Veronica continues to smile. Despite the many doctor visits, the tests, the pain…she smiles.

We are asking for your help. There is currently no match for Veronica on the registry.

Through financial support from people like you, we are able to host more drives and give more HOPE to the many patients in need of a match.

We want to save more lives. Over the past 7 years, we have helped more than 500 patients find their match. Your donation will help us add more potential life-savers to the registry. We are hopeful that one of them will be a match for Veronica.

give the gift of hope

Please consider a donation and help us continue to give the Gift of Hope.

If you missed part 1 of our 4 part series, you can read it here.

Icla da Silva is a 501(c)3 organization and your donation is tax deductible.

Thank you.

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A Season For Giving – Part 1 – The Gift of Life

SEASONS GREETINGS!

This Holiday season we are sharing four inspiring stories from our patients and friends. We hope that these stories move you and incite you to make a donation.

The Season represents a time for giving. For us, it’s about Giving the Gift of Life. We use the funds that we receive to add more potential donors to the Be the Match registry. We are hoping to find that perfect match, a Gift of Life for one of the many patients that we work with.

One of those patients is Asaya Bullock.

When Asaya was just 8 months old, he was diagnosed with a rare autoimmune disease called IPEX syndrome. A person with IPEX lacks the ability to regulate their immune system, they loose the capability to defend against disease. It can also cause the immune system to attack the body’s own tissues and organs.

Asaya often feels pain throughout his entire body. Although he is allowed to attend school, he misses many days due to treatments, or simply because he doesn’t feel up to it. Asaya and his family have been searching for a bone marrow donor for most of his life.

Asaya is African American and West Indian Caribbean. Unfortunately, his ethnicity is not well represented on the bone marrow registry. Only 23% of African American patients with a blood cancer are successful in finding a matching stem cell or bone marrow donor. By comparison, Caucasian patients with the same diagnoses, have a 77% chance of finding a matching donor.

There simply aren’t enough potential donors who have joined the registry. The Icla da Silva Foundation is trying to change this by adding more people to the registry who are ethnically diverse.

In the last 7 years, the time Asaya has been fighting his disease, we have added more than 200,000 potential donors to the registry. Unfortunately, there is still no match for Asaya.

We will continue until we find one.

By donating just $100 you can help defer the cost of adding one person to the bone marrow registry. With your help, we will find a life-saving donor for Asaya and many other patients like him Please donate and help us Give the Gift of Life to children like Asaya.

please donate today

You can read part 2 of our 4 part series here.

Icla da Silva is a 501(c)3 organization and your donation is tax deductible.

Thank you.

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You’re the Hero this World Needs on #GIVINGTUESDAY

Every year, millions of people around the country stash money away in their bank accounts for Black Friday and Cyber Monday, but they don’t realize that the most important date of all follows right after on November 28th: Giving Tuesday. While you may want to buy a ton of gifts for your family, you can also help a stranger in need this coming holiday season.

Giving Tuesday focuses on you being the hero and giving back to those in your community in a big way. The best part? You don’t have to be a millionaire to do so! The day is a toast to the everyday human becoming a superhero and doing out-of-this-world work. Join forces with those around you and contribute this Giving Tuesday to help others gain another chance at life.

Celebrating 25 years of heroic work, we proudly encourage you to strap on your suit and armor on November 28th to save lives. Beyond donating, you can join the registry yourself or volunteer to further assist us in conquering the villainous diseases that some are unfortunate enough to face. Your generosity means the world to those in need, and one small donation may save someone from the villain in their story.

So how does the money help? One of the primary purposes of the money raised is to help cover the costs for finding more matches for those in need of a bone marrow transplant. The more people that are found, the more lives that can be saved. Unfortunately, this cannot be done without the necessary funds. Your generosity could be the biggest gift someone receives this holiday season – and in their entire life.

Being partnered with the largest recruitment center for bone marrow the United States, we have the good guys on their side, but we need more power to dominate evil – you.  Your inclusion in this battle for the brave is life-changing.

Interested in donating one-time or sending a recurring gift each month? Be sure to check out our donation page so we may continue to steer citizens clear of fiendish foes wreaking havoc upon the human body.

Don’t forget that you too can be a hero this holiday season during #GIVINGTUESDAY, and help save those in need of a bone marrow transplant. Spread the word and join forces with those beside you in hopes of adding another bystander to your fight against the biggest villain some people will ever see.

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