The Nikolas Foundation , a 501(c)(3) non profit, was started by a special needs father in honor of his son Nikolas who was born with what is called in the medical business, multiple congenital anomalies. Those anomalies required a number of surgeries, special care and services not necessarily covered by insurance.
As his family struggled through Nikolas’s two years of life they found that the wealthy don’t have a fiscal challenge. The less fortunate are covered by multiple programs available for those families. The working family really falls between the cracks for help as a middle income family usually has assets and resources that keep them from getting assistance.
His family faced many hard decisions as he tried to find ways to fund the needs of his son. Many times the family was told to liquidate their holdings, file for bankruptcy and go on welfare as the only way to utilize many of these state and federal services.
As an old midwestern family that was not an option. The hard decisions to pay bills or pay for services needed were made every week. It took, as many of you know, a number of years to recover financially and emotionally and get back on track.
At The Nikolas Foundation, helping special needs children and their families up close and personal means just that. It is all about the needs of the child and/or the family.
Many support groups exist and a number of other support areas for special needs families. These are wonderful groups for gathering information and meeting others that face many of the same challenges. We are not a classic support group. We meet with the families to define their needs based upon the challenges they face in every day life. We work to take away some of those challenges to let the families focus on taking care of their special needs child.
We are currently working through the Social Services departments of several Children’s’ Hospitals. Our procedures are driven by their recommendations after being reviewed by our Executive Committee.
Need medical deductibles paid, need to have someone buy your groceries or pay your mortgage for the next month so you can get your cash flow reset? This is what we are about greater than 95% of the funds raised go to help children and their families directly.