In 1922 a wealthy philanthropist, Dora Moness Shapiro, known for her involvement in social problems, learned of the devastation tuberculosis could inflict on its victims. This illness became the focus of her life and she vowed to find a way to provide help and hope for those suffering with this terrible disease. She was deeply touched by the suffering these patients endured and realized that added to their physical pain was financial anguish and the problems an illness of such long duration could produce.

Dora's plan was to build a TB Sanatorium where desperately ill patients could find help and heal without worrying about cost. With her mission in life set, she then established the sanatorium's simple philosophy for its future, "There should never be a price on life." This is still the mission of DEBORAH Heart and Lung Center today.

Realizing her dreams would require substantial funding, Dora began to solicit the interest of friends, asking them to organize auxiliaries that would raise monies to help support the sanitorium. Basically, this laid the groundwork for the grass-root volunteer and chapter network that consists of 21,000 members today, located along the Eastern seaboard from Maine to Florida.

Over time, when DEBORAH's avenues of health care were becoming more extensive, encompassing pulmonary, cardiac and vascular diseases, the leadership of DEBORAH recognized that the business of raising funds was becoming more complicated and a more comprehensive coordinated approach to fundraising was needed; thus in 1974, the DEBORAH Hospital Foundation was established.

Today our 275 community based chapters and our regions are ambassadors of information about our Center, providing a strong presence in their areas through their fundraising activities. Within the Foundation, new specialized departments of fundraising have developed, supplementing the chapters effort to stimulate interest and new sources of income through friends in business, labor organizations industry, corporations, foundations and organizations that help maintain our 161 bed hospital.