Saving lives, one heart at a time
Mary Beth Schewitz hopes to give thousands of Lake County high school students what her son, Max, didn't get -- the chance at a long life with a healthy heart.
Max, 20, died unexpectedly Sept. 29, 2005, of an undiagnosed heart condition.
His death prompted Schewitz to start a foundation whose primary goal is to provide electrocardiogram --EKG -- screenings for every student at Lake County's 21 high schools to detect possible heart ailments.
"Unfortunately, in this age group, the first warning sign is often death," said Schewitz, of Lake Bluff. "Six to seven young adults die every week in this country from hidden cardiac causes."
To start, the Max Schewitz Foundation will provide EKG tests for 1,800 Lake Forest High School students Sept. 6 and 7, in partnership with DuPage County-based Midwest Heart Foundation.
The Midwest Heart Foundation, an offshoot of Midwest Heart Specialists, has screened 9,125 students at six DuPage high schools since 2006 through its Young Hearts for Life program. Its goal is screening that county's 58,000 high school students on a biannual basis. This is the group's first foray into Lake County.
"We would like this program to become a model for other communities to adopt," said Jennifer Pooley, program project manager. "We don't limit this to just athletes because we believe, after talking with coaches and administrators at the schools, all students are primarily active."
The Young Hearts for Life program is the brainchild of Joseph Marek, a Downer's Grove cardiologist who wanted to develop a practical way of screening for heart conditions that could cause sudden death in young adults.
He said studies conducted in Europe showing an 80 percent reduction in sudden deaths with EKG tests prompted him to start a program here.
"This is something that's doable on a large scale," he said. "If you look at 100 victims of sudden death in young adults, about a third of them have this condition called hypertrophic cardiomyopathy. Over 90 percent of people with HCM have an abnormal EKG, so there is a way of detecting this."
Marek said it is like looking for a needle in a haystack, so the more students screened the better.
Why not screen kids in middle or even elementary schools?
"You have to start some place," Schewitz said. "The physical demands and stress levels are higher for adolescents. (High school) is where you have the highest aggregate number of students in one concentrated area. We are using donated funds and volunteer resources, and you want to have a big impact."
To hold down costs, Lake Forest High School parents will be trained to conduct EKG tests Sept. 5. It costs roughly $22 to test each student. The Max Schewitz Foundation is paying the $40,000 to test all Lake Forest students.
Schewitz said she hopes to find funding to offer free EKG screenings to high schools. Her ultimate goal is legislative change to get EKG tests covered and prescribed routinely for children.
"You don't want cost to be a factor in somebody not being able to get the test," she said.