Can you help me so that I can play with my friends?

My friends say, “Come and play with us!”

But my lungs can’t handle it.

We need your support

Please help Thomas and other children living with Pulmonary Hypertension today

Watch our video

Thomas dreams of simple things like riding a bike, going to school, and playing with friends.

Pulmonary hypertension robs children like Thomas of a normal childhood. Parents watch their children endure invasive, life-saving procedures, knowing that their child may never reach adulthood.

You can help. With every donation, we can make a child’s life a little better, we can get closer to better treatments, and we can give children like Thomas a way to see their dreams come true.

Will you help Thomas today?

Children with Pulmonary Hypertension Can’t:

Run, play, or dance

Because they do not have enough oxygen.

Cycle, roller skate, or ski

Because their medications mean even a small bruise could be fatal.

Go to school, parties, or events

Because they are at too high a risk of infection - even common germs can put them in the hospital.

Swim, bathe, or play in the water

Because of life-sustaining tubing and 24-hour infusion treatments.

We Need Your Help to Fund Relief Packages for Children Suffering from Pulmonary Hypertension

Learn More About Why Pulmonary Hypertension Children Need These Supplies:

1. Oxygen Concentrator

Oxygen therapy is part of Thomas’s life. It’s the same for every child who lives with Pulmonary Hypertension. Health insurance will provide bulky oxygen therapy equipment. But, it will not pay for a portable oxygen concentrator.

A portable oxygen concentrator is like a key to a jail cell. With an oxygen concentrator, children can receive critical oxygen therapy outside of their room's four walls.

An oxygen concentrator allows children to go on holidays with their family and see the outside world.

2. Spare Pump

When a child is diagnosed with Pulmonary Hypertension, a new companion is introduced into their life—a medicine pump. Parents use the vital pump to deliver critical medicine. This medicine is not available in a regular pharmacy, and it must be refilled every 24 hours.

The pump and medicine must be handled with extreme caution and kept sterile.

The pump delivers a vital drug into the child’s heart chamber every 30 seconds. If the pump fails, the child may only have a half-hour or less to get to a specialist, or the child may die.

A backup pump is a matter of life and death. But life insurance won’t pay for an extra pump.

3. Adaptive Scooter

Children with Pulmonary Hypertension can’t run or play like other kids. They are often trapped inside, living a life of intense loneliness. They have to carry a pump and oxygen supply with them everywhere they go. However, most children cannot carry this equipment by themselves and still walk outside.

A special adaptive scooter gives children with Pulmonary Hypertension a chance to move around safely outside and interact with other children.

The one thing most kids with Pulmonary Hypertension want more than anything else is to be able to be with other kids.

An adaptive scooter makes this possible.

Thomas and other children like him have been through a lot. All these children and their families want is to be able to breathe and to enjoy the outside world.

Your donation will make this possible. You are giving these children and their families hope. You are giving them the freedom to breathe away from their homes and hospitals. We can’t do this without you. We need your help like you need air to breathe.

How your donation can help Thomas and other kids with pulmonary hypertension

Pulmonary hypertension robs children like Thomas of the air they need to lead a carefree childhood.

But you can help! When you donate to O2Kids, you help us improve children’s quality of life, and give parents and children hope for a better future.

Increase Life Expectancy

Availability of Medication

Improving Quality of Life

Hope for a Better Future

What is pulmonary hypertension?

Pulmonary hypertension is an incurable disease that keeps children like Thomas from being able to lead normal lives. Because of constricted blood vessels on the right side of the heart, blood is not oxygenated properly.

Eventually, the disease will progress and lead to right-heart failure. In order to survive, children have to take blood thinners and undergo invasive procedures that take months to recover from. Children with pulmonary hypertension cannot run, dance, or play sports because too much exertion could kill them. The blood thinners the children take turn them into hemophiliacs, meaning they cannot run around like other kids, because even a small bruise could be fatal for them. Children with pulmonary hypertension are often lonely, sickly, and feel isolated from their friends.

You can help!

Your donation can free children like Thomas from their isolation. You can help improve their lives. Perhaps most important of all, you can offer hope and demonstrate to Thomas and other children that people do care about them.

The other kids say, “Come play with us!”

But my lungs say NO.

Thomas is isolated from other children and the world. Because of his pulmonary hypertension, he cannot ride a bike, play football, or even run around on the grass.

It’s like being in an invisible prison, watching the world go by, thinking that nobody cares about you.

You can help Thomas and other kids like him

Your donation brings Thomas hope

Every donation brings hope to children like Thomas and their parents. It helps children have better access to life-saving medications and improves the quality of life for children like Thomas.

Children per 1 milion are affected in Europe

Member Associations in PHA Europe

Children are affected in Europe

Patient members in national associations

Become part of a worldwide community and give kids like Thomas a happy childhood.

My goal is to visit a concert with my grandchild once in my life.

Children with PH live a lifetime like we did in the Corona lockdown.

My lucky number is 8. That is how many pills I have to take every day to see my children grow.

PH is only 'rare' until it happens to you or your child.

Every time I walk in steps, I am reminded of my illness.

A patient with Pulmonary Hypertension experiences shortness of breath whilst walking every day of their life, unlike other patients who have times when they feel better.