We're a little more than halfway through IC Awareness Month and we want to finish the month with a BANG!!!! We urgently need you to do three things to help us finish this campaign!

1. Please use your social networking groups (Facebook, Myspace, Twitter) to spread the word about IC Awareness Month by posting a link to our awareness website: http://www.icawareness.org. You can also post the IC Awareness Daily Facts each day!
   
   
2. Please send the IC press release to your local paper and ask them to do a story on IC. It's easy and will take just a minute our two. Visit your paper's website and find the name and email address of your news editor. Then cut and paste the letter below!

Dear Editor - As a patient with interstitial cystitis (IC) in our town, I have struggled to get recognition and medical care. Some doctors are still telling patients that pelvic or bladder pain is "all in their heads." Some women have undergone unnecessary hysterectomies only to discover, afterwards, that their symptoms were coming from their bladders. Teens with IC are often punished for asking to use their restrooms during school years despite a doctors note.

This month, patients around the world are uniting to spread the news and raise awareness about IC and other pelvic pain conditions so that patients receive compassionate care. I'm asking you to share our story and to help us find patients who are suffering in silence at home alone. There are treatments now available that can help.

Please consider doing a story about IC and/or our IC Awareness Month efforts. It's almost 2011 and there's no reason to be embarassed about having a bladder condition. We must spread the word and let these patients know that they are not alone. I would be happy to talk with you and share my story.

The official press release, fact sheets, physician interview opportunities and patient stories can be found at: http://www.icawareness.org

(You can cut and paste the press release into your letter as well! Find it here at: http://www.icawareness.org/pressrelease100410.html)


3. Send a letter to your your local city council, county, state or federal representatives asking them to issue proclamation. Just visit their appropriate website, find a contact email address and send the following text to them.

   Dear (insert name),

   I was hoping that you could support our efforts to raise awareness for patients struggling with a rarely discussed medical condition, interstitial cystitis. Here in (insert your city or state name), as is true around the country, women with pelvic pain are often told that it's "all in their heads" while men are often mislabeled as having prostatitis. Some women have undergone unnecessary hysterectomies only to discover, afterwards, that their symptoms were coming from their bladders. Teens with IC are often punished for asking to use their restrooms during school years despite a doctors note.

   The sorry truth is that patients often go for years believing that they are having repeated bladder infections only to discover that they have a bladder injury instead. And with that delay comes decreased quality of life, increased disability and worsening of the condition.

   IC Awareness Month is our opportunity to raise awareness in government, schools and the medical community. There are patients in our community who are suffering in silence, at home alone. They need solid, practical information and, of course, hope. Hopefully, this campaign will give them the encouragement they need to seek additional medical care.

   I thank you for your support! More information can be found at: http://www.icawareness.org
   
   Sample proclamation text is as follows:
   
   IC Awareness Month Proclamation

   Whereas, 3 to 8 million women in the USA and 1 to 4 million men of all ages suffer the devastating effects of this chronic pelvic pain disorder; and

   Whereas, medical research efforts into interstitial cystitis/bladder pain syndrome have yet to discover the cause nor cure for this disabling medical condition and federal research money has been severely reduced in recent cuts; and

   Whereas, many physicians are unaware of the symptoms and effects of interstitial cystitis/bladder pain syndrome, causing patients to suffer for many years before they obtain a correct diagnosis and medical treatment; and

   Whereas, there is a critical need to educate and support individuals and families affected by interstitial cystitis;

   Now, Therefore, Be It Resolved that October 2010 is hereby designed as Interstitial Cystitis Awareness Month during which patients, support groups and organizations call for increases in public and private sector funding for medical research, targeted educational programs for health professionals, patients and the public and recognition of urological disorders as a significant public health issue.

   Proclaimed This Day, (insert date) October 2010

Don't forget to email us with your results and/or send us a copy of the proclamation and/or articles!

E-mail: info@icawareness.org

FAX: (707)538-9444

Snail Mail: IC Awareness Month Campaign, PO Box 2159, Healdsburg CA 95448

Enjoy These New & Free Downloads

Props, Kudos and IC Hugs

• For Lynn Wagner-Decker for getting the Hendricks County Flyer to do a story on IC, which appeared on Wednesday October 20th on page A6!
• For Julie Kindt Gedde's for asking patients to donate to IC research center, William Beaumont Hospital, via the Facebook Birthday Wish Program. This is a lovely way to raise money for the purpose.
• The City of Shawano WI and Mayor Lorna Marquardt for issuing a proclamation on behalf of IC Awareness Month!!! Yay!!!
• To April W. for creating an awesome poster blending breast cancer and IC Awareness Month Campaigns. View it on our downloads page.
• The dozen or so IC patients who are trying to get major regional newspapers to do a story on IC, including Denver, Atlanta, Chicago, NYC. Go for it!!
• IC patient Louis Borsato for putting together a display about IC at the Black Creek Community Health Center in Toronto CANADA. Yay!!!
• IC patient Shereen Yunos for writing an article about the obstacles she faced in receiving a diagnosis in Malaysia.
• The City of Santa Rosa CA and Mayor Susan Gorin for issuing a proclamation for IC Awareness Month Campaign. Read it here!
• Urotoday, the leading urology research website, for announcing IC Awareness Month. Read it here!
• IC patient Lisa Henderson for writing an article on IC that appeared in the Norton Telegram (KS).
• 950+ patients joined the IC Awareness Month Cause in the first week!
• IC patient Jaime Coronado for setting up the IC Awareness Month Cause on Facebook!! Her daughter brought IC awareness posters to school and got the health teacher to do a class on IC.
• IC patient Shereen Yunos for coordinating the IC Awareness campaign in Malaysia.
• IC patient Wendy Farrell for telling her story about IC to her local paper and getting a wonderful article written in the paper.
• IC patient Missy-Ellen Dufourq for designing the posters we're using this year! Awesome job!

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