Raising Money for Ellen – Lupus

Ellen is a 26 year old single mother of two young children. She started experiencing a variety of health problems after having her youngest child. After a drastic decline in her health late 2011, she was finally diagnosed with lupus. Before and after diagnosis she has accumulated several thousand dollars in medical bills, yet to be paid. She recently lost her health insurance but was able to continue coverage through Cobra coverage which will expire in less than a year. However the cost of maintaining the health coverage plus prescription costs average her about $800 a month. Now there is a new medication on the market that has shown to be very successful in the treatment of lupus. Because the medicine is so new it is not always covered by insurance. Even if the insurance company eventually agrees to cover the medication.... it runs $3000 a month, so her portion would still be completely unaffordable. Her illness has made it very difficult for her to work, making it nearly impossible to afford the medicines she is already on.