Our friend, noted comics writer John Ostrander, has been battling glaucoma for years now.

If he loses, he loses his eyesight.

John recently under went a surgical procedure called Glaucoma Filtration Surgery (trabeculectomy). The surgery is a treatment when medications cannot lower eye pressure enough. Excess interior fluid in the eye or pressure erodes the optic nerve – that’s basically what glaucoma does. Over the past several decades, John had grown resistant or allergic to some of the meds he had been taking that have kept the pressure down. This site helps explain the procedure and this is a good general site about glaucoma itself.

As of now, the surgeries have been deemed a strong but tentative success for John. Unfortunately, like so many Americans, John’s rather expensive health insurance didn’t cover all the costs of saving his eyesight… not even near. The procedure was done in Boston and required two separate week-long trips to Boston, as well as repeated follow-up trips to track his progress and make adjustments.

John was aware that he could not afford the surgeries on his own; that’s when we, his friends and family in the comic book field, decided we had to do something to help. Too often in the comics world we find ourselves holding events after we’ve lost a creator who has given us so many years of joy. Now we have a chance to help one before its too late- after all it would be terribly hard for John to write dialog for pages he cannot see.

At the 2009 Chicago Comic-Con, we joined forced with Wizard Entertainment to hold a charity auction to begin the goal of raising sufficient funds to help cover the costs of John’s treatments . We barely scratched the surface of wonderful items to place up for auction.

On Wednesaday August 19th, look for a list of new & remaining items here and a schedule on how you can bid on them fron ANYwhere.

If you missed the LIVE Auction from WIZARD WIORLD – here a special re-broadcast SATURDAY AUGUST 15th & SUNDAY AUGUST 16th at 9pm (Eastern Time) ONLY On:

THE POINT YOUR POP CULTURE CHANNEL
Listen live FREE here

Click here to listen
OR HERE on your mobile phone

If you enjoyed John’s work on such projects as (in alphabetical order):
Batman, Bishop, Blackhawk, Captain Atom, Catwoman, Deadshot, Doctor Who, Dynamo Joe, Elfquest, Eternal Warrior, Firestorm, GrimJack, Hawkman, Justice League, Heroes For Hire, The Kents, Legends, Magnus Robot Fighter, Martian Manhunter, Munden’s Bar, The Punisher, Quicksilver, Rai, Spectre, Starslayer, Star Wars, Suicide Squad, Warp, Wasteland, Wolverine, and/or X-Man…
we hope you’ll take the time to bid on these items or make a contribution.

In the meantime, if you do not care to bid but would like to contribute now, please click below

To contribute goods for the auction* or donate by check or money order** please send to:
Mike Gold/Adriane Nash
arrogantMGMS
304 Main Ave
PMB 194
Norwalk CT 06851

**Please make checks payable to John Ostrander”

Our deepest thanks.

The Comix4Sight Committee