A New Permanent Smile For Bill

This my good friend, Bill Sims. He is a 36 year old guy who lives in Nevada.  He has Cerebral Palsy (CP).  As I have gotten to know Bill over the last year, I have learned how much CP has impacted his life in ways that I did not understand were possible.

Because of Bill’s disability, he depends on Medicaid to live his life day-to-day.  He makes $813 a month exactly which he uses to pay for rent, utilities, & groceries.  Not much is leftover each month to pay for other expenses since he is not legally allowed to save more than $2000 at a time - otherwise, his Medicaid will be revoked.

Another disadvantage of Medicaid is that it never provided Bill the opportunity to receive routine preventative dental care through most of his adult life.  As a result, he very rarely received dental cleanings.  In July 2020, this led to having all of his teeth pulled in order to avoid a dangerous amount of bacterial infections in his mouth.  Luckily, Medicaid covered this procedure as well as paid for a new set of dentures.  These were completed in December 2020 & even though they were delayed by 3 months (leaving Bill without teeth during Thanksgiving and Christmas), they look great on him!

Bill is now facing a new problem.  Not many people realize that CP can have a significant impact on the strength of someone’s muscles in their mouths.  An example of this is that Bill is not able to touch the roof of his mouth with his tongue because of the weakened state of his muscles. I was devastated to learn that Bill cannot use his dentures because his mouth is not strong enough to hold them in place.  He recently saw a specialist who said that it would be possible to get permanent dentures with dental implants, but this was going to cost $35,000, possibly more the longer he waits as he may need bone grafting as well.  Medicaid will not cover this procedure in any way.  With Bill’s limited income, this is just not financially feasible for him to pay for.

If Bill had these dentures, he would not only be able to eat normal food but he would gain self confidence again to be able to go outside everyday and smile as he has ambitions to get a job.  This has done damage to his self esteem and self image.  Bill is one of the most loyal people I have ever met in my life.  He stands up for those he feels are victims of injustice, and he would fight tooth and nail to help any of his friends.  This is why he deserves to have this GoFundMe.  Please consider helping Bill earn enough donations so that he can get the dental implants he needs and the quality of life that he deserves. Lastly if anyone does donate, of course thank you & if you'd be willing to share Bill's Gofundme link to your friends and family, I know he'd appreciate that.