It’s that time again. It’s Health Rising’s BIG, BIG, BIG (but also little) fundraising drive. It’s big in that it’s when we get more support at this time of the year than other but little in that we don’t need what the big organizations do. We don’t have expensive staff or offices to rent and we’re not doing expensive research – we’re just getting the word out as much as we can. As to that…
Getting the Word Out
What words are those?
- We Amplify (at every opportunity) the Fact That These Diseases That Need More Funding – This seems like a never-ending theme – but it’s still a necessary one. These diseases need much more support. Check out the stories in Lives Interrupted to see the many ways these diseases affect people.
- The Progress That is Being Made – It may blur over time but every week progress – sometimes small, sometimes large – is being made and new avenues (serotonin – who knew?) are opening up as broad themes (herpesvirus activation, energy production, blood vessels, hypometabolism, dysautonomia, gut dysregulation, brain issues) – are being strengthened and that’s good news.
- The Treatment Possibilities That Are Opening Up – It’s been a wild year with many new treatment possibilities opening up. God knows how many will pan out (nicotine – really? :)) but we will cover everything as thoroughly as we can. We’ve done blogs on rapamycin, guanfacine, anti-clotting and anti-platelet treatments, stellate ganglion blocks, TUDCA, apheresis, Paxlovid, metformin, LDN/Mestinon, beta-caryophyllenes, psychedelics, H202. Blogs on monoclonal antibodies (whoa!), nicotine (creative!), stimulants (hmm..), a cannabis treatment backed by ME/CFS experts (:)), and more are coming up shortly.
- Recovery May Not Be Common, But it is Possible – Our Recovery/Recovering series over the past yea highlighted the remarkably varied ways (rapamycin, BCG vaccine, MCAS, an artificial intelligence-created protocol, cerebral spinal leak patch, electrolytes/anti-inflammatories, etc., that people have used to recover. Yes, we would love to have one, two, or three answers – that would make it a lot easier – but it’s good to know that some recovery is happening.
Making ME/CFS, FM, Long COVID, POTS, etc. More Visible in so Many Ways
Health Rising’s Big Map program is also making ME/CFS, FM, long COVID, and other diseases more visible in three ways:
- Visible Costs – The Lives Interrupted project is making the financial, relational, and other costs of these diseases visible in clear and dramatic ways.
- Visible Community – Soon we’ll open our Big Map project to everyone and give you the opportunity to find friends and allies in your local areas that you didn’t know were there. We want to make visible the opportunities for communication, understanding, learning, and collaboration that are around all of us but currently hidden.
- Visible Doctors and Health Practitioners – The last part of Health Rising’s Big Map project will not only make the doctors, attorneys, and other resources in your community visible but also allow you to rate them – thus helping you to find the best help possible.
Coming up…Next year our Treatment Review project will come online.
Eight Ways to Support Health Rising
Paypal, checks, Amazon gift cards, Bitcoin, bequests – we gladly accept them all. (Please note you do not need to have a Paypal account to send money through Paypal (see below).
Our goal is to raise $70,000 during this drive. Thanks for your support!
Recurring Donations
Please push a little money our way.
(1) Become a Recurring PayPal Donor – Health Rising’s recurring donors provide our financial bedrock. They allow me to sleep better at night. 🙂
The great thing about recurring donations is that even if they’re small, they really add up. You might not notice the $5, $10, or more dollars going Health Rising’s way monthly, but we do. It all adds up.
To become a recurring donor, simply go to the PayPal widget below or to the right sidebar of any page, click the amount you would like to donate ($5, $10, $15, etc.), and hit the Subscribe button.
Or, if you’re doing a one-time donation, PayPal will give you the option of making it a recurring one.
(2) Already a Recurring PayPal Donor? Want to give more? – (Want to give more than the current options allow? Just let me know! :)) Simply contact me using the Contact form (upper right-hand of the page), stating that. I will stop your current donation and you can restart it.
(3) Become a Recurring Donor with Online Banking (non-PayPal) – Not happy with PayPal? Use Bill Pay, Zelle, or similar programs at your bank to send checks or electronic transfers straight to us. If you’re with Wells Fargo, we can set up automatic monthly donations. Please contact me via the contact form (upper right-hand of the page).
One-Time Donations
(4) Make a One-Time PayPal Donation – One-time donations are Health Rising’s biggest source of income.
- Donating through Paypal without having a Paypal account – it’s easy- simply give us your email address using the Contact Us button in the blue menu bar near the top of the page and tell us how much you want to give. (If you live outside the U.S. let me know which country so I can convert it to the proper amount..)
Use our handy donation widget to make a one-time or recurring donation. (To give a recurring donation, click on the amount and then click “subscribe”.)
(5) One-Time Checks! – We love checks! Please make out checks to Health Rising and send them to the below address.
Cort Johnson
404 Boulder Hwy
PO Box 91245
Henderson, NV 89015.
Outside the Box
(6) Amazon gift cards! – Amazon is Health Rising’s go-to place to get electronic accessories, books, stuff for the vehicle, etc. Simply go here, find your gift card and put my email address (cortrising@gmail.com) in the “To:” box, and voila – instant Amazon gift card!
(7) Amazon Affiliate Sales – Amazon’s affiliate payments are surprisingly generous! If you’re in the U.S., simply search in the Amazon box on the lower right-hand side of any page on this website. Anything that you put in your cart and buy from that search will qualify for an Amazon affiliate payment to Health Rising. (Things that are already in your cart will not). You don’t pay any fees or anything like that. It’s a win-win situation. 🙂
Others
Airline miles, rewards points, bequests, places to stay (I’m traveling the West), dog watching are all possibilities. Have some more ideas? Please let us know.
Dear Cort
Have given a wee something to your fundraising. Good luck with it.
Big thanks for all you do. Your words and the whole health rising site has given me much hope and connection and often in very dark times. please keep up the good work.
I hope it doesn’t take too much out of you though?
Warmest wishes from Bonny Scotland.
Jo and Vana
How nice from Bonny Scotland! I would love to visit there someday. Thanks so much, Jo and Vana, for your support 🙂 Saor-làithean saor to you! 🙂
Hope it goes well! Health Rising is there and has been there, for people over many years. You look at the various ideas, research and different approaches, with a steady and well informed gaze. Thank you 🙂
Ahh! A steady and well-informed gaze – so nice! Thanks, Tracey!
If there’s anyone who deserves a donation, it’s you Cort. Thank you, thank you, thank you for all the work you do for all of us. We feel passionate about you, and we really need people like you, who get things done and who don’t give up. .
Merci beaucoup à Claudine et joyeuses fêtes à vous! 🙂
Structural brain changes detected in novel long COVID imaging study
https://newatlas.com/medical/structural-brain-changes-detected-long-covid-imaging/
“To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study comparing patients with long COVID to both a group without history of COVID-19 and a group that went through a COVID-19 infection but is subjectively unimpaired,” explains Alexander Rau, lead author on the study from University Hospital Freiburg in Germany.
The research utilized a relatively new brain imaging technique called diffusion microstructure imaging (DMI). The technique tracks the movement of water molecules through brain tissue to deliver a high-resolution picture of the microstructures of the brain.
Looking generally for brain lesions or abnormalities, the researchers detected no notable differences between COVID patients and those uninfected. However, zooming in on the microstructural brain differences revealed significant alterations in the COVID cohorts.
“Here, we noted gray matter alterations in both patients with long-COVID and those unimpaired after a COVID-19 infection,” says Rau “Interestingly, we not only noted widespread microstructural alterations in patients with long COVID, but also in those unimpaired after having contracted COVID-19.”
So what separated the long COVID patients from the fully recovered COVID patients?
The researchers discovered three long COVID symptom constellations (fatigue, loss of sense of smell, cognitive impairment) could be correlated with specific patterns of microstructural changes in the brain. So what distinguished long COVID patients from recovered patients seemed to be how the illness particularly reshaped the brain.
“Expression of post-COVID symptoms was associated with specific affected cerebral networks, suggesting a pathophysiological basis of this syndrome” Rau notes.
While the results affirm the real pathological foundations underpinning long COVID they do raise a number of questions the researchers hope to investigate in the future. For example, do these microstructural alterations improve over time as a long COVID patient’s symptoms change? And is there anything that predisposes a COVID patient to develop the brain changes that characterize long COVID?
The new research will be presented at the 2023 Radiological Society of North America Annual Meeting this week.”
Thanks for sharing this study. Maybe the various folks promoting brain training related approaches are on to something after all.
If our own efforts can help to retire these changes in the brain, it makes sense that recovery is possible.
Nice! Thanks Ann! We haven’t had that many brain studies yet. Expect a blog on it 🙂
I am so happy to find this organization for CFS/Fibromyalgia. I read the New England medical journal to try and stay up to date. I would love to be able to donate but 0 finances. Things may change, if they do I will donate.
Ahh – so nice of you to say, Julie! Good luck with your finances and thanks for your kind words 🙂
In 2021, I was ready to retire but 2022 brought COVID into my life TWICE. Now the lingering symptoms continue, and have taken over my life. I continue to see numerous healthcare providers and take many tests, all of which come back normal. I need some guidance and help. Where do I go? Who do I talk to? Thank you.