Celebrate a New Year of Miracles Sunday, January 27 from 3:00 p.m. to 11:30 live on

How You Can Help	History of Telethon Sponsors and Supporters

It is often said that children are our future. For 26 years, the East Tennessee community has been supporting that precious future by contributing to the work of East Tennessee Children's Hospital through the Children's Miracle Network telethon.

Children's Hospital was a charter member of the Children's Miracle Network (CMN) in 1983 and was one of 22 hospitals participating in that first telethon with WBIR-TV 10 as one of the original telethon broadcast stations. Since that first telecast to raise money to serve the health care needs of this area's children, the CMN broadcast from Children's Hospital has raised about $25 million - a testimony to the support offered by the community to care for its children. More than $1.9 million was raised during last year's broadcast.

One of the major reasons Children's Hospital became a partner in the Children's Miracle Network was because all funds raised during the CMN broadcast stay at Children's Hospital to help the children of East Tennessee, Southeast Kentucky, Southwest Virginia and Western North Carolina with a variety of medical needs and health concerns.

The success of this year's CMN broadcast for Children's Hospital is especially crucial for one important reason: children from throughout the region will make almost 144,000 visits to Children's Hospital this year. Many of these children will need sophisticated medical equipment in various hospital areas. Proceeds from this year's Children's Miracle Network telethon will buy new and replacement equipment for many areas of the hospital.

During the Children's Miracle Network broadcast live from Children's Hospital on WBIR-TV 10, you'll have the opportunity to see amazing children from throughout the region who Children's Hospital has helped with their specific medical needs. These children might go to school with your children and grandchildren, attend your church or synagogue, and visit the same stores where you and your family shop. We hope you will be inspired by these children and their families and learn how their medical situations have been helped through the caring professionals and state-of-the-art equipment at Children's Hospital.

You can help make this year's CMN broadcast for East Tennessee Children's Hospital the most successful telethon in history - by sharing your resources and making a difference in the lives of area children. Your support helps ensure that each child who comes to Children's Hospital, now and in the future, will be able to receive the medical care he or she needs, regardless of their race, religion or parents' ability to pay their medical bills. If you have ever purchased a Miracle Balloon, participated in a fund-raiser or made a monetary pledge to a previous telethon, we wholeheartedly thank you - on behalf of the children who come to us for health care each day of the year.

Please join us beginning at 3:00 p.m. on Sunday, January 27, and continuing through 11:30 p.m. on WBIR-TV with host Bill Williams and the entire Channel 10 broadcast family for a weekend that will make a difference in your life and the lives of East Tennessee's children.

For more information about the Children's Miracle Network or the CMN broadcast, or if you would like to volunteer to help, please call (865) 541-8441.