Young Hearts for Life®

3/15/2019

(YH4L) Cardiac Screening Program at St. Francis High School on March 21, 2019

St. Francis High School has partnered with the Young Hearts for Life® Cardiac Screen Program in order to provide an opportunity for our students to receive a free heart screening known as an electrocardiogram (ECG). Please read the letter below from Dr. Marek, Founder and Medical Director.

For further information, please read the Young Hearts for Life document which is listed below Dr. Marek's letter and visit their website at www.YH4L.org. We sincerely hope you will consider giving your child permission to participate in this screening and that you will consider volunteering (a medical background is not necessary) to help us make this event a great success.

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Dear Parents,

We are pleased to bring the Young Hearts for Life® (YH4L) Cardiac Screening Program to St. Francis High School on March 21, 2019. All students whose parents authorize them to be tested will be screened. Please be aware that repeat ECG testing is recommended every two (2) years.

YH4L will provide this free heart screening called an electrocardiogram (ECG) to identify high school students at risk for sudden cardiac death and to increase the public's awareness of this issue. To date over 200,000 students have been screened as a result of YH4L. More information about the screening can be found on the YH4L website (www.yh4l.org).

A simple ECG, when used to screen young adults can detect certain serious heart conditions. Recording the electrical activity of the heart using electrodes attached to the skin with a mild adhesive, can detect approximately 60% of the abnormalities or “markers” from these heart conditions that are associated with sudden cardiac death that a stethoscope cannot. Please note that ECG screenings result in less than 2% of the tests being falsely positive. This may require additional evaluation and testing by your physician. We believe that the benefit of this potentially lifesaving screening outweighs this concern.

We encourage you to discuss this screening with your child. Your child’s participation in the screening is your decision. We want to assure you that students’ confidentiality, privacy and individual modesty will be respected throughout all aspects of the program. Only female technicians will test girls and they will be screened in an area separate from boys

The Young Hearts For Life® Cardiac Screening is being provided this year to the students by YH4L and St. Francis High School. For more information about this program, please visit our website at http://www.yh4l.org/. If you have questions, please contact us at 630-785-4366.

Sincerely,

Joseph Marek, MD

Founder & Medical Director, Young Hearts for Life® Cardiac Screening Program

Cardiologist, Advocate Medical Group

_____________________________________________

St. Francis High School

Free ECG Screening

March 21, 2019

TO REGISTER YOUR STUDENT FOR THE YH4L EVENT:

To sign your child up for this FREE cardiac screening, please go to

http://www.yh4l.org/. Click on the drop-down Menu that says Registration & Events and choose Registration & Results. Click on Chicago Region High Schools. To access the registration page, read the YH4L information and then click on the “I Am Giving Permission for my child” Icon (located at the bottom of the page).

Online registration will close at 12:00 pm the day before the screening.

Please DO NOT register your child at a different school.

To register your child you will need to have their Student ID number available. This number is located on your child’s actual ID card.

TO SIGN UP AS A PARENT/COMMUNITY VOLUNTEER FOR THE SCREENING:

In order to make this event successful, we need to have parent/community volunteers. Thank you for your interest in helping us provide ECG screenings to the students at St. Francis High School on March 21, 2019. The screening is offered during the school day. Medical training is not necessary to be a volunteer. All volunteers must attend one of the training sessions on March 20.

We're using SignUp.com for volunteer sign up for our event with Young Hearts for Life.

Please sign up for St. Francis High School!

Here's how it works in 3 easy steps:

1. Click this link to go to our invitation page on SignUp.com: http://signup.com/go/GsdZxHp
(THIS LINK IS FOR VOLUNTEERING ONLY)
2. Enter your email address: (You will NOT need to register an account on SignUp.com)
3. Sign up! Choose your spots. Be sure to sign up for your training session as well as the shift you will work at the screening. Please consider joining us for the entire day. SignUp.com will send you an automated confirmation and reminders. Thank you.

QUESTIONS:

General questions, please contact:

Pam Kiefer, School Nurse, at pkiefer@sfhscollegeprep.org

Volunteer questions, please contact:

Laure Donati at lauredonati@sbcglobal.net

Lyn Schmidt at lyndajs@juno.com

Mike Radel at mradel@equip-soluntions.com

Link to a pdf of the above information.