{"id":4,"date":"2018-08-06T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2018-08-06T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cota1.wpengine.com\/cotaforteamalexs\/our-story\/"},"modified":"2018-08-06T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2018-08-06T00:00:00","slug":"our-story","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/cota.org\/cotaforteamalexs\/our-story\/","title":{"rendered":"Our Story"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"videoWrapperJon\">\n<h1 class=\"rtecenter\"><strong>Want to find out if you&#8217;re a bone marrow match for Alex?<\/strong><\/h1>\n<p><\/p>\n<h2><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong>In the United States?<\/strong><\/span><br \/><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Visit his Be the Match site for testing information or a kit by visiting <strong><a style=\"color: #000000;\" href=\"http:\/\/bethematch.org\">http:\/\/BeTheMatch.org<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>You can also visit <a href=\"http:\/\/www.GiftinKind.org\">www.GiftinKind.org<\/a> and <a href=\"http:\/\/www.DKMS.org\">www.DKMS.org<\/a> if you&#8217;re 18 to 55.<\/span><\/h2>\n<p><\/p>\n<h2><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">In the UK?<\/span><br \/><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Visit <strong><a style=\"color: #000000;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.anthonynolan.org\/\">http:\/\/www.anthonynolan.org<\/a><\/strong> to register<\/span><\/h2>\n<p><\/p>\n<h2><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">We have also parntered with Gift for Life!<\/span><br \/><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Regardless of where you&#8217;re located, you can visit <strong><a style=\"color: #000000;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.GiftofLife.org\/dc\/SwabForAlex\">www.GiftofLife.org\/dc\/SwabForAlex<\/a><\/strong> to register.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/span><\/h2>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"videoWrapperJon\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/16U1glDJEMQ\" width=\"625\" height=\"352\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/div>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h1 style=\"text-align: center;\">This is Alex&#8230;<\/h1>\n<p>Alex Sims was diagnosed with&nbsp;<u><a href=\"http:\/\/www.cotaforteamalexs.com\/node\/424\">IPEX syndrome<\/a><\/u>&nbsp;in 2016 &ndash;&nbsp;an extremely rare autoimmune disease that most doctors have never heard of &ndash; with fewer than 200 diagnosed cases. In addition to muscle, joint, skin and digestive problems, Alex developed Type I Diabetes at the age of 2 and has experienced countless hospitalizations due to viral infections. &nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Alex is in the third grade. He loves reading and really enjoys being at school with his friends. At school, Alex gets to forget about his disease and just be a kid. When he grows up, he wants to be a super hero. Iron Man is his favorite because he has protective armor and nothing can hurt him.<\/p>\n<p>Most IPEX kids die within the 1<sup>st<\/sup>&nbsp;or 2<sup>nd<\/sup>&nbsp;year of their lives. Alex wasn&rsquo;t diagnosed until he was 8 years old and has a different genotype of IPEX than&nbsp;other kids did. Doctors are hopeful that with a bone marrow transplant, he will be able to survive IPEX until a cure is found.<\/p>\n<p>There are so many expenses involved with IPEX treatment &ndash; extensive hospitalizations, monthly specialist visits, weekly labs, immune suppressing medication and the bone marrow transplant itself, the costs of which could reach up to $800,000!<\/p>\n<p>In addition to raising the money for COTA in honor of Team Alex, a matching donor needs to be found.&nbsp;There are currently 20,000 people who could benefit from a bone marrow\/stem cell transplant and an estimated 3,000 people die each year&nbsp;while&nbsp;waiting for a donor. Donor screening is simple with a through-the-mail cheek swab&nbsp;testing kit.&nbsp;The ideal donor is age 18 to 44, but donors through age 60 may be used in certain cases.<\/p>\n<p>In order to take care of Alex, his dad had to give up his job. COTA for Team Alex needs all of your help. Please share Alex&#8217;s story on social media, volunteer to be a bone marrow donor, and&nbsp;donate&nbsp;to COTA today. Every donation can&nbsp;help save&nbsp;the lives of kids like Alex!<\/p>\n<p>The Children&#8217;s Organ Transplant Association (COTA) helps children and young adults who need a life-saving transplant by providing fundraising assistance and family support. COTA is the nation&rsquo;s only fundraising organization solely dedicated to raising life-saving dollars in honor of transplant-needy children and young adults. 100% of each contribution made to COTA in honor of our patients helps meet transplant-related expenses. COTA&rsquo;s services are free to our families, and gifts to COTA are tax deductible to the fullest extent of the law.<\/p>\n<div class=\"videoWrapperJon\">&nbsp;<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Want to find out if you&#8217;re a bone marrow match for Alex? In the United States?Visit his Be the Match site for testing information or a kit by visiting http:\/\/BeTheMatch.org You can also visit www.GiftinKind.org and www.DKMS.org if you&#8217;re 18 to 55. In the UK?Visit http:\/\/www.anthonynolan.org to register We have also parntered with Gift for [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":5,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-4","page","type-page","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cota.org\/cotaforteamalexs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/4","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cota.org\/cotaforteamalexs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cota.org\/cotaforteamalexs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cota.org\/cotaforteamalexs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/cota.org\/cotaforteamalexs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/4\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cota.org\/cotaforteamalexs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cota.org\/cotaforteamalexs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}