Charities

HOME|ABOUT US

Board of Directors Financial Information History of CHC Leadership Membership

|MEDIA|CONTACT US|OFFICES

Community Health Charities of America

Text Size

Our Charities

Stories of Caring

Giving at Work

Campaign Resource Center »Combined Federal Campaign Employee Engagement »Our Corporate Partners Why CHC?Why Give At Work?

Getting Started Promoting the Campaign Expand An Existing Campaign Wrapping Up Evaluate & Assess Participating Year Round

Charities-at-Work

Get Involved

Health Matters At Work

Our Charities

Parkinson’s Disease Foundation
A leading national presence in Parkinson’s disease research, patient education and advocacy. Funds promising scientific research and offers educational programs, referral and one-on-one advice services.

Telephone: 800-457-6676
http://www.pdf.org

CFC Code: 11410
IRS EIN Number: 13-1866796
AFR: 13.9% What's this?

Heather Hinrichsen’s Fight to Win

Heather Hinrichsen’s Fight to Win design for Parkinson’s Awareness Month is now featured on a t-shirt being worn by hundreds of people throughout the US. She submitted her design to the PDF Parkinson’s Awareness Month T-Shirt Contest and received over 800 of the 1,900 votes, beating four other designs. What’s the story behind her design and how did she do it?

read the story

Ms. Hinrichsen, 36 years old, lives with young-onset Parkinson’s. A busy mom, she and her husband Todd have two children, ages 2 and 3. She does her best to check the websites of Parkinson’s organizations, such as PDF, every few weeks. In February, she found a story about PDF’s Parkinson’s Awareness Month T-Shirt Contest. An avid scrapbooker, Ms. Hinrichsen wanted to try her hand at it. She and Todd had previously discussed designing a Parkinson’s t-shirt, so she thought, “Why not design it for the contest?”

Ms. Hinrichsen’s design, featured above, includes the phrase, Fight to Win, a message that seemed to resonate with the voters who pushed her design to the top of the list. She chose this phrase because it’s something she has done herself while coping with young- onset Parkinson’s.

Ms. Hinrichsen was diagnosed at the age of 33, when her first child was just three months old.She fought to come to terms with her diagnosis as a young mom, to find the right doctor to address her needs as a young person with Parkinson’s, and to find support from people who could understand what she was going through. Less than two years after her diagnosis, sheand Toddhad theirsecond child. She is now a stay-at-home momto her two young children and occasionally still works in a volunteer capacity in her career as a physician assistant, for example, recently flying to Haiti with a medical team to assist with earthquake relief efforts. She also found friendship among a support group made up solely of young mothers who are living with PD.

What is her hope for the awareness t-shirt? Ms. Hinrichsen says, “First, I hope that by sharing my story, people will realize that Parkinson’s is not just an older person’s disease. It can strike younger people. Through the shirt design, I also want to spread the message to everyone to fight PD. I plan to fight until I win - I have PD, but it doesn't have me."

close the story

[Read more stories]

$5 per month will enable 160 people to call our Parkinson's information specialists toll-free and will help distribute our comprehensive "Information Packet" to people with Parkinson's, caregivers and families.
$7 per month will allow 10 patients to receive personalized responses via email from health/medical professionals on any aspect of Parkinson's through our website's "Ask the Expert" feature.
$10 per month will help us support a medical student in the PDF Summer Fellowship program, contributing to vital research under leading scientists and encouraging careers in Parkinson's research.

The Parkinson’s Disease Foundation (PDF) is a leading national presence in Parkinson’s disease research, education and public advocacy. We are working for the nearly one million people in the US who live with Parkinson’s disease (PD) by funding promising scientific research to find the causes of and a cure for Parkinson's while supporting people with Parkinson’s, their families and caregivers through educational programs and support services. Since its founding in 1957, PDF has funded over $80 million worth of scientific research in Parkinson’s disease, supporting the work of leading scientists throughout the world.

At the heart of PDF's work is the participation of people with Parkinson's. Whether it is through our People with Parkinson's Advisory Council, which advises us on all projects, or the Clinical Research Learning Institute, which trains people with PD to play a part in clinical research - the perspective of people living with Parkinson's ensures that our work is on target and meets the needs of the community.

Research

Central to the mission of the Parkinson’s Disease Foundation (PDF) is funding research of the highest caliber. Through our diverse research programs, there is a single underlying objective: to identify and support the most promising Parkinson’s disease science.

Education

The mission of the Parkinson's Disease Foundation is not only to pursue the cure for Parkinson’s but also to provide assistance to the people who live with the disease. A top priority for PDF remains the dissemination of accurate, accessible information about Parkinson’s to people with the disease and their families. Through our innovative educational programs, PDF remains a trusted source of Parkinson’s information. Through outlets such as our Parkinson’s Information Service (PINS), a “one-stop shop” for the Parkinson’s disease community, our team of information specialists can answer questions about Parkinson’s via our toll-free helpline, (800) 457-6676, and our “Ask the Expert” web service.

Advocacy

For more than a decade, the Parkinson’s Disease Foundation has assumed the role of public advocate on behalf of, and in collaboration with, people with Parkinson’s, their families and caregivers. One example is thorugh training people with Parkinson’s to educate and empower the broader community about the importance of Parkinson’s clinical research through our Clinical Research Learning Institute, an annualmulti-day educational seminar.