There are 3.1 million American adults and children that are affected by Crohn's disease and ulcerative colitis, and as reported by a recent NY Times article, this number only continues to rise. As an IBD patient and scientist, I have spent the last 15+ years working with the Crohn's and Colitis Foundation to fundraise to help to continue patient education and support our research missions.

Many of you know that my involvement with the Foundation has increased in recent years, both as a member of the NJ Chapter Board of Directors and the Chapter Medical Advisory Committee. I have also served on the National Scientific Advisory Committee, helping to shape patient education initiatives and as a grant reviewer. Labs like mine rely on Foundation funding to explore new directions in our research and think "outside the box" in our approaches to find new therapies for IBD. Your donations not only help directly support the research mission, but provide much needed patient education resources and help support Camp Oasis, which from personal experience I can say changes the life of kids with IBD.

Many of you may not know that in the last year, the IBD community, particularly those involved in Camp Oasis Georgia, have lost several of friends to IBD-related complications including Ty Redler, Lindsay D'Ercole and Lacey Conners. Since Ty was an undergraduate researcher with me during my fellowship in Chicago, I am dedicating our fundraising for this year in his memory.

Therefore, I'm asking that if you can, please make a contribution to my Take Steps Walk team Two-Ply Minimum this year. The more money we raise together, the closer we will be to making life more manageable for those of us who live with these diseases every day.