Goals and Results

One of the essential foundations of Love Without Boundaries is providing programs to children which produce REAL results. We continually evaluate our projects and make changes when needed to provide the best care possible to children in need. A central goal of all of our programs is to enable as many children as possible to find families through adoption. To date, over 2000 children served by LWB are in permanent, adoptive homes around the world.

CompassionHealing Homes

Our healing homes program's four main objectives are:

  • Decreasing the mortality rate of orphaned infants born with medical needs
  • Decreasing the length of time for an orphaned child to be ready for surgery
  • Increasing the number of infants with medical needs whose paperwork is prepared for adoption
  • Decreasing the stigma surrounding children born with medical needs

LWB has the capacity to meet all four of these objectives thanks in large part to our wonderful infrastructure of staff, hospitals, doctors, and foster care parents in China.  Every home is run by a full time manager who is in daily contact with our overseas volunteers.  LWB has signed contracts with both local hospitals and physicians to provide timely and expert care to the children in our homes.  Children are brought to our healing homes at the earliest possible opportunity, so they are able to gain the weight and strength needed to have a safe, successful surgery at the earliest possible time. Once a child has had corrective surgery and is in good health, orphanages are much more confident that an adoptive family can be found, and will begin preparing adoption paperwork.  Through our healing homes, we have shown the surrounding communities that these children are beautiful kids who are not to be feared, shunned, or ignored.  People visiting and working in the homes are able to see these children for the normal children they are. Through public outreach and by placing children in local foster care, we are spreading the message to others that all children deserve to be loved and embraced.

Success rate: One hundred fourteen children from 41 orphanages were served in our healing homes program in 2011. 

Mortality rate: Many, or possibly even most of our residents, would not have survived without the intervention of a healing home, but we are able to report a 4% mortality rate over the past 12 months. 

Adoption rate: Most orphanages will not register a child with major medical needs for adoption, until they have been fully healed. Ninety-five percent of children in our healing homes have had their adoption paperwork filed by the time they are discharged. In addition, 49 children from our program were actually united with families through adoption in the past 12 months.

Funding for our homes comes primarily though individual donors who are assigned to a specific child in the home, or who donate funds to be used wherever needed. Donations come in lump sums or in monthly installments. Annual fundraising events such as an art auction and the Marine Corps Marathon raise money to help with additional medical expenses.  We provide monthly updates to each donor and/or sponsor, outlining the progress of their child, plus an additional monthly updates on the home in general. When a child leaves for surgery, additional updates are sent to sponsors, explaining details of the procedure and recovery until the child is able to return to the home. Post-surgery updates continue quarterly even after the child leaves our home, up to the one year post surgery milestone. Each month we provide three to five photos, weight, physical and developmental milestones, and the observations of our monitors, medical staff and volunteers. Our volunteer staff is available to field any questions that sponsors may have about the health and well-being of their sponsored child.

AchievementEducation

LWB's Education Program's “Believe in Me” in-orphanage schools were set up to serve children with medical needs who cannot attend public school. The main objectives of these schools are:

  • Providing children with special needs the opportunity to learn
  • Encouraging orphanages to file adoption paperwork on as many children as possible

LWB is able to provide essential school services to these children by renovating classrooms, hiring full-time teachers, and providing them with Montessori-inspired training and materials.  All children who enter the schools are initially evaluated for classroom placement and then are evaluated on a regular basis for progress. On-site managers are hired for every school to ensure accountability and progress of the program.

In each of our five Believe in Me schools, children who were severely institutionalized are now experiencing the joy of learning.  Many children were non-verbal, diagnosed with mental retardation, and classified as “unadoptable” when our school projects first began. After being in a classroom setting, with teachers who invest themselves into the children’s lives, we have seen amazing results.  Many children are now classified as “healthy” children and have gone on to find permanent homes through adoption. LWB served 197 students in 2011. Donors to our Believe in Me schools receive regular updates on the children they sponsor.

HealingMedical

LWB’s Medical Program has the primary goal of providing excellent medical and surgical care to every child who comes into our hands. To achieve this goal, we have identified the leading surgeons and physicians for each medical need in China. LWB negotiates contracts with top hospitals, such as the Children’s Hospital of Fudan University in Shanghai, the First Affiliated Hospital of Fujian Medical University in Fuzhou, and Anhui Children’s Hospital in Hefei.  We also help facilitate continuing medical training by being the liaison for medical exchange trips both to and from China.  We also have physician advisors in the United States who consult with us on complex cases.

Over the years LWB has built one of the most effective medical programs in China.   We employ local medical managers in each city where we have a hospital contract and only use hospitals that we know provide quality care to orphaned children.  At all times, the well being of the children comes first.  All appropriate pre-surgery tests are done for each individual case, such as heart echoes, catheterization, CT scans, MRI, and blood tests, in order to make an informed evaluation of a child’s need.  We develop solid pre- and post-operative care plans for each child, and we monitor each child throughout the healing process and for at least one year after discharge.

LWB regularly evaluates our medical program, checking for both mortality and complication rates with each procedure done. In 2011, our medical program helped over 300 children.  Since the start of LWB in 2003, we have provided medical care to over 1,900 orphaned and impoverished children in China.

We rely on the generosity and compassion of individual donors to fully fund the surgeries and medical care the children in our program need.  Once a child is fully funded we are able to arrange the child’s care.  In cases of emergencies, we have a designated fund set up to use specifically for children who simply cannot wait until their care is fully funded.  In these cases we arrange the necessary care and then fundraise to replenish this emergency fund.  Donors receive reports and photos on the children they help sponsor for medical care at one, three, six, and 12 months post surgery.  When a child arrives at the hospital for surgery, additional updates are sent to sponsors, explaining details of the procedure and recovery. Our volunteer staff is available to field any questions that sponsors may have about the health and well-being of their sponsored child.

HopeFoster Care

LWB truly believes that every child deserves a family of his or her own. Our foster care program's goals are:

  • Transitioning children from an institutional setting into good quality, loving family environments
  • Promoting the attachment cycle
  • Decreasing post-institutional delays
  • Encouraging community acceptance of children with special needs
  • Increasing the number of children whose adoption paperwork is filed

To enable us to achieve our goals, we work collaboratively with social welfare institutions and have signed contracts with each orphanage for the areas where we have foster care programs.  LWB staff work closely with orphanages to find qualified local foster families for each child.  We also have local LWB managers in each city, who visit the child every month to check on progress, support the families, and offer advice.  Our managers work closely with the orphanages regarding both the paperwork and the welfare of each and every child in our program.

We are overjoyed to see many of children we serve adopted each year. Our foster care program served 330 orphaned children in 17 cities throughout China in 2010, with 74  finding permanent, adoptive homes.  We often receive letters from adoptive parents telling us how wonderfully well adjusted the children from our foster care programs are.

To enable us to keep the children in foster care, we rely on a wonderful loyal donor base.  As costs have risen sharply in China over the past year, we are pleased to say that our donor levels and income have also risen to enable us to increase our funding for our foster care program. Supporters to this program receive monthly photos and updates on the children in our care.

ContentmentNutrition & Orphanage Assistance

The main goal of LWB's Nutrition and Orphanage Assistance Programs is to assist orphanages throughout China in meeting their children’s basic needs. These include both nutritional needs, by providing high quality formula and rice cereal, and essential material items, such as safe cribs, coats, clothing, diapers, etc.

LWB has two full-time directors in China who work with orphanages to identify their most critical needs.  Our orphanage assistance staff work closely with individual donors and groups to decide which projects to take on, and to ensure their donations are utilized as intended. For one-time orphanage projects, such as new cribs or coats, reports are sent to donors upon completion of the project. For our nutrition projects, children in our programs have their heights and weights recorded regularly to track their growth.  In our nutrition programs, we have seen increased health, better skin and hair conditions, fewer infections, and the caregivers have reported much happier children.   Donors to our nutrition program are given quarterly updates with photos.

In 2010, 77 orphanages in nine provinces were served with orphanage assistance projects.

Email for more information on any of our programs