Donations

[Guest guest]

Hello Folks - I want to express my appreciation to Pat Kennedy, one of our LA area patients, for sending out the e-mail to the discussion group recently.

For the benefit of those of you who are on the CIG list and not on the discussion group, Pat suggested that she was pleased with what CIG and had done for her, that she was making a contribution, and was encouraging others to do the same.

This, of course, was great, because I hate to be the one to be hammering on the issue too often, and Pat's appeal was very helpful and flattering.

But now, having said that, I must myself add that any and all donations will be much appreciated.

Let me tell you what happens to the money. First, it has to go through the LRF (Lymphoma Research Foundation) with which we work, because they are a tax exempt organization, and that way you get a tax receipt. However, the money, once it arrives there, falls into a separate bucket, ours.

As Pat explained, if you donate direct via the www.cllinfogroup.org web page, this happens automatically and you get an e-mail which serves as your official thank you for the IRS. (We're dressing up the "thank you" page on the web site a bit on Monday, but the e-mails go out as always.)

If you donate by check, please make it out to the LRF and write in big letters at the lower left "memo" section of the check FOR CLL or FOR CIG. (LRF's address is 115 Broadway, New York, NY 10006.) You then get a paper "thank you" for the IRS.

Now, the money does several things. We will use it for patient education (teleconferences, literature like the CLL report you all received last year, and updating of the web site). Also, and this will be big news, we are coming out with a "Red Book", a disease specific CLL/SLL booklet. You may have seen a blue book or a green book in doctors's offices, they are for Non-Hodgkin and Hodgkin lymphomas in general. This will be like that, but CLL/SLL specific. I am pretty sure it will be out in a few months

Finally, once we have enough money, we will attempt to fund and influence medical work, grants and trials having to do specifically with CLL/SLL. Be aware that some of this is already happening, through the generosity of one of our people. We will have more to say when the research currently funded is more advanced.

So this is just a little explanation.

And, I must not forget, the "matching donation program" is still in effect!!! Anything you give now will be doubled by a matching program from a generous donor.

I thank you all in advance. Year end may be a good time to do this.

And once again, a healthy 2009!!!

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