May is National Mobility Awareness Month or Mobility Month!
Mobility Month is a time to recognize the power of mobility and accessibility to enhance lives, improve health and care, and connect individuals to their communities.
At Help Hope Live, we provide trusted medical fundraising that helps individuals bring mobility and accessibility essentials within closer reach. That’s why we celebrate Mobility Awareness Month every year.
In this post, learn why we celebrate Mobility Month, why mobility can often come with an overwhelming price tag, and how to read stories from our community that showcase why mobility matters.
Last Updated: May 2026
What Is Mobility Awareness Month?
In 2012, the National Mobility Equipment Dealers Association (NMEDA) established National Mobility Awareness Month.
Mobility Awareness Month encourages support, awareness, and education around the impact of mobility on the lives of these individuals as well as their caregivers and communities.
Mobility & Disability Statistics (2026)
Mobility Awareness Month is a time to recognize that people with mobility-impacting disabilities or diagnoses are a huge part of our society.
As the CDC reports:
- 12.2% of American adults have a mobility-impacting disability.
- 1 in 4 American adults is living with a disability.
- 1 in 4 American adults with disabilities had an unmet health care need in 2023 due to the cost of care.
Mobility Is More Than Movement
Mobility can represent more than someone’s ability to walk, move independently, or complete tasks without assistance.
Mobility is reliable access to medical care.
Mobility is the power to physically access medical providers and emergency care when you need them.
Mobility is safe transportation.
Mobility means accessing consistent, reliable, and safe transportation that accommodates the devices you use for mobility, including walkers, canes, wheelchairs, power chairs, and prosthetics.
Mobility is protection from mobility-impacting health risks.
Many individuals living with disabilities need specialized care and equipment to keep their bodies strong and prevent muscle deterioration, pressure sores, blood pressure drops and spikes, and other significant health risks.
Mobility is life-changing therapy and rehabilitation.
For a diverse range of diagnoses, access to consistent therapy or exercise-based rehabilitation may significantly enhance health and mobility.
Mobility is accessibility.
Full participation in daily life and your community may depend on your ability to access locations safely without risks to your safety.
Accessibility means consistent access to tools, assistive technology, workplace modifications, and other life essentials. Accessibility often depends on creating spaces, devices, and web standards that don’t demand a certain level of personal mobility for access.
Accessibility also ties in closely to ableism, or discrimination against people with disabilities based on the bias that people without disabilities are more capable or more deserving.
When workplaces, public spaces, and digital platforms are designed prioritizing people without disabilities, they become or remain inaccessible, creating consistent barriers to access, mobility, health, travel, work, and other facets of life.
Mobility is access to devices and medical equipment.
Individuals with disabilities rely on a wide range of devices and medical essentials to access consistent care and live life fully.
Specialized medical equipment, home health care, and a wide range of devices can contribute to maximizing daily mobility and reducing limitations.
Mobility is support for caregivers.
Mobility often impacts not just one person but their entire community of support, including their caregivers.
Without the right equipment, transportation, and support, caregivers may take on personal risks just to provide consistent care.
Mobility is freedom and independence.
Mobility matters because mobility represents so much more than any one single concept of movement.
For so many people, mobility means freedom and greater independence—enabling community access, new opportunities, better health, travel and connections, recreation, exercise, communication, work opportunities, daily life satisfaction, and more.
Read Stories from the Disability Community This Mobility Month!
For our nonprofit, Mobility Awareness Month is a time to help improve understanding of why mobility matters while highlighting how fundraising can help place mobility-enhancing equipment and services within reach.
Click the button below to read some of our favorite stories about why mobility matters, and subscribe to this Latest blog so you can receive an email when we post a new transplant interview this year.
The Financial Burden of Mobility
Greater mobility is a source of hope and health for millions of Americans and thousands of individuals in the Help Hope Live community. However, mobility often comes with substantial out-of-pocket expenses that individuals and families can’t cover without help.
Did you know that meeting fundamental mobility needs can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars out of pocket per year?
Here are just a few examples of mobility costs that are often not covered by insurance:
- Exercise-based rehabilitation and other therapies
- Medical travel
- Surgery and hospitalizations
- Caregiving and home health care services
- Home modifications for accessibility
- Safe accessible transportation, such as a wheelchair van
- Assistive technology
- Customized prosthetics
- Specialized wheelchairs and other durable medical equipment
Resources for Mobility & Disability
Though insurance may help with some of the costs associated with mobility, most individuals living with a disability will encounter costs that insurance will not cover.
That’s why our nonprofit exists: to help prevent medical care, mobility needs, and other essentials for living with a disability from becoming a financial burden.
We provide trusted medical fundraising with one-on-one support, medical verification, tax-deductible donations, and maximum protection for state-based benefits.
If you or someone you love is facing mobility, disability, or chronic illness out-of-pocket expenses, apply to start a trusted medical fundraising campaign with our nonprofit:
We know that medical fundraising isn’t the right fit for everyone. That’s why we also maintain a vetted directory of injury and illness resources. This directory includes support groups, trusted organizations, and sources of direct financial aid such as grants.
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