APFED Honors Michaella Lesieur with 2018 Elizabeth Allen Award

July 13, 2018

Every year, APFED’s Executive Board recognizes an APFED member who has shown a deep commitment to our mission and made impactful contributions in the areas of research, education, advocacy and awareness. This year, it is our honor and pleasure to present the 2018 Elizabeth Allen Award to Michaella Lesieur.

Named for one of APFED’s founding mothers Elizabeth (Mays) Allen, this award is presented in recognition of an outstanding community member who goes “above and beyond” to help APFED advance our mission and reach our goals.

Though she is the youngest recipient of this award at age 23, Michaella has long been a strong voice and dedicated force in our community.  For the past four years, she has worked on a variety of platforms and through many channels to raise the awareness of eosinophil-associated diseases.

For the past three years, Michaella has organized a very successful Hope on the Horizon Fun Run and Walk in Massachusetts, where supporters have raised more than $19,000 to benefit APFED’s HOPE on the Horizon Research Fund. Michaella has held this event in honor of her mother, who was diagnosed with Hypereosinophilic Syndrome (HES), a rare eosinophil-associated disease of the blood that can affect any organ.

In addition, Michaella has created awareness-raising toolkits for National Eosinophil Awareness Week (held the third week in May) and produced a video to showcase APFED’s #READ4EAD campaign. She has also raised awareness in her community by writing about eosinophil-associated disease in her college newspaper and holding an educational event at an elementary school that was featured by local media.  Most recently, Michaella completed her honors thesis project at UMass Dartmouth on the communications associated with fundraising.

Please join us as we recognize and celebrate Michaella’s contributions to our patient community. We are grateful for her hard work, enthusiasm, generous spirit, and all she has done to support families living with eosinophil-associated diseases!