The Israel Crohn’s Disease and Ulcerative Colitis Foundation – CCFI
CCFI is a charitable organization dedicated to providing support, information and education to patients, families and caregivers, the public, organizations, authorities and medical professionals within Israel, on Inflammatory Bowl Diseases (IBD) – Crohn’s Disease and Ulcerative Colitis.
Our goals:
- Empower patients, families and the medical professionals
- Demystify the diseases
- Normalize realities surrounding the diseases
- Promote rights and avoid discrimination
- Make life more livable
Our mission:
We support, advocate, educate, empower and promote connectedness for people affected by Inflammatory Bowel Disease, as well as those involved in the care, treatment and mitigation.
CCFI and IBD in Israel:
- CCFI established in 1994 by a group of dedicated parents
- Supervised by the Israeli Corporations Authority
- Estimated 30K IBD patients in Israel among them thousands of children
- There are five centers of IBD excellence in Israel. CCFI continuously collaborates with these centers and with clinics in the periphery (Pop. 7.6 million)
We focus on:
- Distributing reliable INFORMATION
- Raising AWARENESS
- EDUCATING patients, family, the medical community and the general public
- Promoting WELL-BEING
- ADVOCATING patient RIGHTS vis-à vis authorities, educational institutions and the workplace
- Improving QUALITY OF LIFE for patients and families
- Supporting RESEARCH initiatives
Our main activities are:
- Providing support:
- Hot line– Operates every day, serving everyone
- aiding approximately 5 callers a day, open 5 days a week
- Organizing support and information gatherings for families
- Providing financial aid for purchasing medications
- Providing access to experts on patient rights issues
- Hot line– Operates every day, serving everyone
- Educating:
- Our new website is continuously expanding and improving to provide meaningful, reliable and undated information
- Arranging patient and medical staff conferences
- Collaborating with medical centers (lectures, support groups)
- Producing and distributing brochures
- Producing CCFI Magazine (Tmichon) – a self-published periodical
- Promoting Quality of Life:
- Special events
- Challenging trips for family fun
- Children’s summer camp in collaboration with Kfar Nahar Hayarden http://www.jrv.org.il/eng_home.htm
- Organizing webinars that provide information and promote sharing of information and experiences
- Keeping IBD issues in the media by:
- Being the “go to” resource on IBD
- Promoting media focus especially around International IBD Day
- Advocating for patients rights:
- Insurance: Social Security (Bituach Leumi), National Health Insurance (Kupot Cholim), private insurance companies
- Educational systems: schools, colleges and universities
- Employers
- Army