Hi everyone,

My name is Sue Johnstal and I am fundraising to help my brother Dennis Nalezyty pay for critically needed dental post implants.

Dennis is disabled due to MS and seizures and has been on disability since his mid 40’s. Many of the medications Dennis takes contribute to chronic dry mouth which is very bad for your teeth. In addition, Dennis survived three bouts of thyroid cancer over the past 20 years and the radiation treatments resulted in a severe loss of saliva, creating even more dry mouth problems. Despite constant expensive dental work, Dennis lost all of his teeth. While we were able to get him dentures several times over the past five years, the lower dentures have always been a problem. Despite working with several dentist, none have been unable to provide lower dentures that fit and will stay in his mouth.

Dennis now has difficulty eating normally since he has to eat without lower teeth. In addition, he is now facing significant bone loss in his lower jaw and only has enough bone to have 2 posts implanted to hold in lower dentures as opposed to the four implants the dentist would normally recommend. If he does not get implants within a year, the dentist fears additional bone loss will prevent the possibility of implants and Dennis will live permanently without lower teeth.

We’ve looked into every possible solution, but Dennis has no dental insurance and any plan we could buy won’t cover this. After extensive research, we have found no programs or grants available to help. The disability Dennis receives barely covers monthly living expenses, so paying such a large amount just isn’t possible for him. I will be contributing a significant amount, but the estimated cost for the implants and lower dentures is $8,000 to $10,000 so I am asking for your help to get Dennis the dental implants that will allow him to have functional lower dentures.

Every single penny raised will go directly toward his dental post implants and dentures, nothing else. Any amount helps, as well as sharing the GoFundMe! Thank you for taking your time to read about this unfortunate situation.