Volunteer
Volunteering is a Way of Paying it Forward!
The Corneal Dystrophy foundation is a 501c3 non-profit. Unlike many other non-profits, our foundation is totally volunteer-run. We pay no salaries to any of our board members, moderators, or mentors. This has been true since our founding more than 25 years ago as a patient advocacy email group .
Our dedicated volunteers do their very best to provide you with the information, education, and support needed to make one of the most important decisions of your life. We do this because we understand how difficult and time-consuming it can be to find accurate information on these diseases.
We value the interaction many of you have on our Fuchs Friends support group where you both give and receive support from those who are still looking for a solution and those who have already found a solution. Stay involved! Fuchs Friends thrives on active participation where there is interaction with members; shared experiences; shared feelings; shared accomplishments. Since we are a non-profit we ask our staff, mentors, and moderators to record the hours they spend while working for you and the foundation. During 2025 the volunteer hours which were reported numbered 1,982 with an equivalent value of $73,133. Many thanks to all our volunteers, especially to those who reported the hours. You are a tremendous resource for us and we appreciate you giving us your precious time and expertise.
There are many other ways you can contribute:
- Recommend a Specialist: If you have had a successful surgery, you could recommend your doctor be added to the Specialists List.
- Share Your Story: If you enjoy writing, you could share your journey with us or post your review on Great Nonprofits.
- Support Fundraising: Help us raise funds since that is our only source of income to keep the foundation working.
- Set Up a Recurring Donation: Your ongoing support helps cover our monthly operational costs.
- Corporate Matching: Ask your employer to match funds you donate to our non-profit.
- Stay Active in Fuchs’ Friends: Continue sharing your insight and experiences to support new members..
Local Groups
If you wish to volunteer or start a local group, please use the contact form.
Our Volunteer History
“Meet Bob Beliizzi and Dorthy Action”
October 1998 – Dorothy Acton was diagnosed with Fuchs’ Dystrophy
November 1998 – Bob Bellizzi was also diagnosed with Fuchs’ Dystrophy
April 1999 – Each starts their own website about this genetic disease and fill viewers with information about Fuchs’
June 1999 – Bob and Dorothy connect and start the e-Circles group, an email list group where everyone gets a copy of each email that any member sends.
October 1999 – E-Circles was acquired by E-Groups who was then acquired by Yahoo Groups. The next move was to take the forums to service, GroupsIO, where we are today. Since then we have grown rapidly and have logged over two million messages of support, help and knowledge to each other not to mention our success stories.
April 2004 – It became obvious that we needed to secure funding sources.
Dorothy and Bob could no longer to afford to pay all of the costs. We started to work on the Foundation, incorporating in California and started the tremendous task of documenting and applying for an IRS 501C(3) Tax Exempt Status and a California Tax Exempt Status. This was approved in 2004.
We celebrate over 20 years as a nonprofit foundation. A true success story.