Organizations that partner with Hearts for Russ provide support to the organ transplant community every day. We could not do our work without them so we are grateful for their commitment to improving the Organ Donor Registry and providing support to the organ, eye and tissue recipient community and the donor families that make organ donation possible.
If your organization would like to apply for a grant or recommend a deserving organization please kindly email heartsforruss@gmail.com with further details.
Harboring Hearts
www.harboringhearts.org
Harboring Hearts provides emergency housing, transportation, food and emotional support programming to heart transplant, liver transplant and cardio-thoracic surgery patients and their caregivers. Working closely with the major hospitals in the New York City region, Harboring Hearts helps hundreds of families every year through their Emergency Fund, 99% of whom have annual family incomes of less than $60,000. In 2022, Hearts for Russ dollars funded their new Telehealth Tablet Program to supply New York Presbyterian-Cornell Hospital with data-enabled smart tablets for transplant patients specially equipped to provide access to appointments, charts and remote support groups. We could not be more honored to support this amazing non-profit.
SODA
https://www.sodanational.org
Student Organ Donation Advocates (SODA) is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization that inspires and supports student-led organ donation education and registration efforts through high school and college chapters. Like Hearts for Russ, SODA was borne out of tragedy following the death of founder Sara Miller’s sister in 2013. While a student at Washington University in St. Louis, Sara honored her sister’s selfless gift of life by advocating for organ donation awareness and SODA’s first chapter was born. The organization now has over 40 chapters on campuses nationwide, a full-time executive director and is having a tremendous impact in the organ donation awareness space. Hearts for Russ is pleased to be supporting SODA’s newest initiative to create chapters at Historically Black Colleges & Universities (HBCUs) by providing scholarships to students, encouraging recipients to begin new chapters and help bridge the disparity in organ donation registration in the Black community.
Chris Klug Foundation
https://chrisklugfoundation.org
Chris Klug’s story of perseverance and selfless devotion to the organ and tissue donation cause is truly inspiring. Following a liver transplant, Chris competed in the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City and won a medal in snowboard cross, the first transplantee ever to win an Olympic medal. He founded the Chris Klug Foundation (CKF) to inspire and educate young adults to increase registration for organ and tissue donation. The non-profit reaches tens of thousands of young people each year, equipping them with facts about organ donation so they can make educated decisions. Hearts for Russ is proud to be the primary sponsor of the CKF Patient Ambassador Webinar Series the past two years. The nationally-distributed webinar features transplant recipients, physicians and other experts in the organ transplant space. Hearts for Russ is pleased to help this wonderful organization spread the word and educate many on the importance of organ and tissue donation.
LI TRIO
www.litrio.org
Hearts for Russ’ longest partnership relationship has been with Long Island Transplant Recipients International Organization or Long Island TRIO. Prior to his transplant, Russ took advantage of the services of this wonderful organization. Over the past eight years, we have worked together on a broad array of initiatives with LI TRIO to provide support for the transplant community. Our proudest achievement was helping to create a multiple film festival winning short documentary called “Gifts of Life: Profiles in Courage from the Transplant Community”. We could not be prouder of our support for the dedicated volunteers at Long Island TRIO.
Donate Life
https://donatelifenys.org
Over the years, Hearts for Russ has also provided support to Donate Life New York, who maintain the organ donation registry in New York and fight for organ donation awareness throughout the state. We are proud of sponsoring a state-wide Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) awareness campaign for Donate Life Month in 2020. If you or others you know are New York residents and not yet signed up on the registry, please visit their website to sign up and save lives!
ODAC
https://www.odacny.org
Organ Donation Awareness Corporation's mission is to inspire New York's youth to register as organ donors by eliminating pervasive myths. The need for organ donation is greater now than ever before, and this need will only continue to grow.
High School Outreach Program
ODAC consists of diverse undergrad students at various schools. Each student brings a specific skill set and ODAC uses it to their advantage. ODAC believes that by being undergrad students they have a connection and respect with high school students, and they use this in their presentations to have an open discussion about signing up to be an organ donor. Hearts for Russ' grant allows ODAC the ability to gain better outreach on social media to reach young people and better present the information to the high school students.
Northwell Health
www.northwell.edu
Organ Procurement Training Pilot Program
When a loved one passes on and is eligible to be an organ donor, the question of wether or not the family would like to donate their organs is most of the time, unsuccessful. WIth proper training and education provided with this program the hope is that the newly trained employees will improve the consent and donor conversion rate. This program will allow the employees to be trained and feel more comfortable of asking the difficult question and provide support throughout losing their loved one more effectively.
Community Events:
Beautification of the Eisenhower Park Rose Garden in Honor of Organ Donors: LI TRIO
At the annual event, donors and donor families are honored. Individual roses are presented to all of our honorees. from the Rose Garden. Some Donor families speak and share their stories. Some of our younger transplant recipients not only speak eloquently at the event but also help distribute the roses to each donor family as the name of their loved one is called. Living donors are also called up to receive a rose as living donors are honored and personally thanked at the event. The beautification of the event allowed for a bigger garden, a plaque in honor of Russ Housman and bricks to be engraved for each recipients donor.
