In April, a little 4-year-old girl came to SSM Cardinal Glennon Children’s Hospital three times a week for treatment, with her grandmother.  The pair never left without finding the little girl’s “heart” on the wall and touching it for good luck.
The heart was one of 800 or so red paper hearts adorning the lobby walls of the children’s hospital in honor of the American Heart Association’s Heart Walk.  The hearts represented Heart Walk donations, including the one made by the little girl’s family.

“It was so touching,” remembers Karen Rewerts, Cardinal Glennon’s area director of strategy and business development and the hospital’s Heart Walk company leader. “During each visit, the little girl and her grandma looked at the hearts on the walls until they found the one they were looking for.” 
The story is just a small example of how the Heart Walk touches thousands of lives, Rewerts says.  The event raises money for 79 different cardiovascular and stroke research projects across Missouri.
SSMHC-St. Louis has been a major sponsor of the Heart Walk for more than five years.  This year’s event, held on May 7 in Forest Park, St. Louis, and Frontier Park, St. Charles, included more than 500 SSM Health Care-St. Louis representatives.

While the event drew participants and sponsors from all over the area, SSM took top honors as the leading fundraiser, bringing in an estimated $145,000 ― a 38 percent increase over last year.  All SSM entities in the St. Louis area participated, including SSM hospitals, the SSM Corporate Lake office, SSM Home Care, the Physician’s Organization, and the SSM Information Center.

“We had great participation,” says Suzanne Schmidt, director of registration services at Cardinal Glennon and SSM Health Care-St. Louis coordinator for the 2005 Heart Walk campaign.  “It was a lot of fun for employees, created good morale for the organization and helped a worthy cause.”

Not to mention the impact the Heart Walk had on a 4-year-old girl.  The Monday after the Heart Walk, when the red paper hearts were being removed from Cardinal Glennon’s lobby walls, the little girl walked in, right on schedule. She was distressed to see that her paper heart was gone.

“We found her ‘heart’ and gave it to her,” reports Rewerts. “Seeing young patients so interested in the hearts reminds us all why the Heart Walk is such a good cause.”