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Six Flags Great America
Join us on June 26, 2010
Online registration has closed for this event. You can register in person at the park on the morning of the walk starting at 7:00am. Day of registration fees are $15 per person.
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Walk Ambassador
Max, an energetic 5-year-old with a mischievous smile, knows virtually every nook and cranny at Children’s Memorial Hospital. And he should, as Max has spent nearly two years of his young life in the hospital. He’s been treated for a heart defect that ultimately necessitated a heart transplant, as well as cancer. But despite his challenges, Max is in most ways a normal little boy
“Most people who meet him would never know what he’s been through,” says his dad, Jared. “He’s very smart and has a great vocabulary, and loves to draw and to play with other kids. He’s very in tune with why he needs to go to the hospital for treatments. His attitude is, ‘I’m OK. Everything is fine.’”
Max was born in a Chicago-area hospital with hypoplastic left heart syndrome, a condition in which the heart’s left side is underdeveloped. If left untreated, the defect can be fatal.
He was transported to Children’s Memorial shortly after birth, where he was treated by physicians in the hospital’s Division of Cardiology. Max spent his first seven months in the hospital and underwent a series of surgical procedures to treat the condition, but after he went into the early stages of heart failure his doctors determined that a heart transplant was necessary. To date, 150 heart transplants have been performed at the hospital since 1988.
Max’s parents were told that it could take between one month and two years for a donor heart to become available. But just two months later, Jared and Max’s mom, Liz, received the news they had been waiting to hear: a donor heart was available for their 2-year-old son.
A team of transplant surgeons in the Division of Cardiovascular-Thoracic urgery performed the procedure on Max. After two weeks in the hospital, Max and his mom stayed for four weeks at Kohl’s House, a “home away from home” near the hospital for transplant patients and their families.
Max was placed on anti-rejection medication, and because of his suppressed immune system he needed to wear a protective mask around others to reduce the chances of developing an infection. He was hospitalized several times to treat viral infections and had problems putting on weight.
In September 2008, after Max underwent diagnostic tests, the Herricks once again received shocking news: Max had developed non-Hodgkin lymphoma, a type of cancer that resulted from his lowered immune system, a condition that in turn was caused by the anti-rejection medication. Tumors were found in his lungs, stomach, intestines, esophagus and rectum.
“It was shocking to find that the one thing that was essentially keeping him alive also can cause cancer,” says Jared.
A portion of the tumor in his lungs was surgically removed, and Max began a course of chemotherapy to shrink the remaining tumors. After several months the tumors had shrunk enough that Max was able to end his chemotherapy treatments, although he needed steroid medication to control stomach and bowel problems that developed from the anti-rejection medication.
Through all Max’s complications and long hospitalizations, Jared and Liz have remained pleased with the multi-disciplinary care Max received from his various doctors, nurses and other professionals.
“You can’t go wrong at Children’s,” says Jared. “It’s the best place possible for kids who are sick.
About the Hospital
Children’s Memorial Hospital, Chicago, is recognized as one of the top pediatric hospitals in the country by rankings published in U.S. News & World Report and serves as a major regional referral center. Its physicians are on the faculty at Northwestern University’s Feinberg School of Medicine. The hospital is currently engaged in the Heroes for Life campaign to raise a minimum of $600 million to help create the Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago and support its medical and nursing professionals, programs and research. As a not-for-profit organization, Children’s Memorial relies on philanthropy to help provide care to 113,000 patients and their families every year.
About the Park
Six Flags Great America offers endless family adventures with seven miles of intense coaster tracks, a free 15-acre water park, spectacular shows and parades, family rides and three children’s areas!
Top Fundraisers
THANK YOU TO OUR CORPORATE PARTNERS
