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Kady Royea

Mrs. DeBock

English 4 Honors

21 March 2019

Essential Question: How do nonprofit organizations help those who need an organ

transplant?

Working Thesis: Nonprofit organizations help those who need an organ transplant.

Refined Thesis: Organ recipients receive financial, emotional and educational assistance

through strong nonprofit organizations.

Coon, Bill. “Keep Swimming Foundation; Recipients Stories .” Email, Google Drive, 19 Mar.

2019,

Bill Coon was the fourth baby in the nation to receive a heart transplant. Bill lived a

normal and healthy life till he was 20 years old and was rushed to the ER, Bill had heart failure

and along with it kidney failure. After spending about seventy days in the hospital, bills medical

expenses along with his families need for a hotel and meals was over 7,500 dollars. In 2009 Bill

received his second heart transplant. Later in life, he became a motivational speaker. Traveling

the country and talking to people with similar stories to his own. Bill learned the average family

spends over 10,000 on medical bills, hotels, and meals during the prolonged hospital stays. Bill

founded the Keep Swimming Foundation. Now he spends countless days traveling the country

and raising money to help families and individuals who are going through rough times due to

hospital bills, giving them the financial assistance they need to get through.
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Coon, Bill. “Keep Swimming Foundation; Recipients Stories .” Email, Google Drive, 19 Mar.

2019,

The Father of a California family was on his way to get on a cruise with his wife from

Seattle to Alaska when he all a sudden collapsed and was rushed to the ER. All of the man's

children flew into Seattle to possibly say there last goodbye to there dad. After intensive care, he

was diagnosed with interstitial lung disease. Unfortunately, he was in desperate need of a

bilateral lung transplant. Between hospital bills, his wife’s need to relocate closer to him, hotel

expenses and bedside meals, bills came to be over 10,000 dollars. Thanks to the Keep

Swimming Foundation the couple did not have to worry about the medical bills nor the expenses

for her to stay close to her husband. Fully covered and taken care of, the foundation gave them

the chance to primarily focus on his health and not the cost to keep him alive.

Coon, Bill. “Keep Swimming Foundation; Recipients Stories .” Email, Google Drive, 19 Mar.

2019,

The daughter of a family in Philidelphia was diagnosed with cystic fibrosis and in need of

a double lung transplant. She was in and out of the hospital for months, every hospital stay was

longer than the last. She was put on the transplant list and underwent numerous treatments.

During these long hospital stays and numerous treatments, the young girls family went through

numerous bills just to be there and support her. Between hospital bills, treatments, gasoline,

bedside meals, and simple expenses you pay weekly the family was put into deep debt. The Keep

Swimming Foundation helped the family pay for the hospital expenses and the gasoline it took to

go back and forth to visit there daughter along with simply making the pressure of money not an
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issue anymore. The family had more time to support their daughter than rather than worry about

if they had the money to keep their daughter alive.

Georgia Transplant Foundation, gatransplant.org/financial-assistance/living-donor/.

The Georgia Transplant Foundation is for only Georgia residents but they help everyone

in the state of Georiga that is financially struggling due to a prolonged hospital stay due to an

organ transplant. The foundation will also assist living donors as well as recipients. Giving them

housing and financial assistance until they can get back on their feet. Hospital bills are pricey,

adding that on top of the normal bills one pays weekly. The Georgia Transplant Foundation has

made a mission to help everyone in their state that is struggling due to organ transplants.

Although it is not a national nonprofit organization it is beneficial and supportive to a smaller

population. Being only available to a smaller proportion the population allows the foundation to

support and help all those who apply and need the help within the Georgia state lines.

Keep Swimming Foundation. “Keep Swimming Foundation Expands Its Mission and

Max Grant Value.” Keep Swimming Foundation, Keep Swimming Foundation, 25 Jan.

2019,.

The Keep Swimming Foundation is a nonprofit foundation that strives to help as many

families as they can through what can be a stressful and terrifying time. Keep Swimming

Foundation was founded by Bill Coon, who had been through two heart transplants and a

prolonged hospital stays. The foundation helps families and individuals pay for bedside meals,

parking, hospital bills, therapy, house bills and anything possible one would need to be stress-

free and work on recovering or helping their loved one recover. The foundation takes in all the
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applications they get and decides who needs the money and how much can they offer them.

Because of all the application, the foundation has been receiving, they had to find a new way to

raise money so they can help more families. The junior board is new to the Keep Swimming

Foundation, the board made up of young high school students who are interested in raising

money purely to help people in need. The board will be able to help decided how much money

goes to the family the Keep Swimming Foundation could not help.

“Let's Go beyond Awareness to Save Lives.” American Transplant Foundation,

www.americantransplantfoundation.org/the-challenge/.

The American Transplant Foundation is a dedicated nonprofit organization that works to

not only match donors and recipients but help with financial battles that keep recipients from

getting the transplant. The national transplant list is prolonged and the donor list is at an

agonizing pause. The American Transplant Foundation raises awareness, persuading and

informing the general population of the need for not only deceased but live donors as well. The

foundation offers educational, emotional, physical, and financial support to the recipient during a

prolonged stay at the hospital while waiting for a transplant to save their life. If someone decides

to become a live donor they are offered financial support to make up for time lost out of work.

The ultimate goal of the Americal Transplant Foundation is to break the barriers that keep

donation and transplants from happening.

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