"I missed a lot of school last year because my heart made me too sick to go," shares 16-year-old Alex. "I'm excited for my surgery so that I can go back to school every day." Alex lives in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, with his parents, two sisters, and one brother. He is in the ninth grade and would like to go to college in the future. He enjoys listening to soccer games on the radio and spending time with his friends. Alex has a condition called severe rheumatic mitral regurgitation. The mitral valve of his heart became severely damaged by an infection and can no longer pump blood to the rest of his body. As a result, blood backs up into his heart, leading to heart failure. Alex needs open-heart surgery to either repair or replace the valve. Alex will fly to the Cayman Islands to receive treatment. On January 24, he will undergo cardiac surgery. This $12,000 surgery is subsidized by Have a Heart Cayman Islands, an organization that helps subsidize and provide life-saving heart surgeries to children from the Caribbean and around the world. Alex's family also needs help to fund the costs of surgery prep. The $1,500 bill covers labs, medicines, and checkup and followup appointments. It also supports passport obtainment and the social workers from our medical partner, Haiti Cardiac Alliance, who will accompany Alex's family overseas.