A local non-profit organization dedicated to the education and awareness of cardiovascular health in the community is hosting its fourth annual Heart Ball on Feb. 22.
The Idaho Heart Foundation hosted its first Heart Ball in 2022 to raise money for AEDs (automated external defibrillators), a portable device that allows a person to perform CPR on a person experiencing cardiac arrest, and now has become an annual community event.
The sentiment behind the event holds special meaning to its founders, Dr. Blake Wachter, Chief Eric Day with the Idaho Falls Fire Department and Jake Gilbert. Dr. Wachter and Jake met when he began experiencing his own heart health issues 10 years ago.
On Father’s Day of 2015, Jake suffered a stroke followed by a mild heart attack, and shortly after, he met Dr. Blake Wachter, a heart failure/transplant doctor for the Idaho Heart Institute. He hadn’t had any serious health problems leading up to that day, and now he was a heart patient, something he couldn’t wrap his head around.
“Heart disease and cardiac problems know no age,” Jake said. “It affects everybody.”
Jake’s heart had swelled up to the size of a softball, and one doctor told him there wasn’t anything they could do. He was devastated. Then came in Dr. Blake Wachter, who asked him to take him as her patient. “I said, ‘Sure, what do I have to lose?’”
On his first visit to the Idaho Heart Institute, he suffered from cardiac arrest and woke up in the ICU with no memory of what had happened. His health was rapidly declining. “I had a hospice nurse coming to administer me medication every day, and I wouldn’t die against all odds,” Jake said. After three months under their care, he was just healthy enough to be sent to Intermountain Medical Center in Salt Lake City, where he would receive his first open heart surgery.
“I walked in, and I was in there for 45 minutes. The doctors walked out and then came back in and said, ‘We cannot legally and morally let you leave the hospital because you won't make it to Ogden. You'll die on the highway. We have a room ready for you; we want to admit you, run some more tests, and get you ready for advanced therapies.’ They were going to install an LVAD.”
“I looked at them and asked if I could go back to my hotel room and think about it,” Jake laughs.
After surgery, he suffered an internal bleed that kept him hospitalized for several weeks. There he met Brent Haupt, whose friendship lifted his spirits. “He’s one of the most humble and gracious guys I’ve ever met,” he said.
On Father’s Day of 2016, Jake suffered another stroke, and without a transplant, they knew he wouldn’t make it to the end of summer. On July 6, he received the call that they had found a match. “I went in, got prepped, and my family and friends rushed down,” he said. The hall was flooded by his family and friends, and when they wheeled him off to surgery, they stopped him at the surgery wing doors, and everyone walked by and high-fived him.
After many long hours in surgery, Jake woke up. During recovery, he continued living in Salt Lake City for another year before he moved home to Idaho Falls. “It was a long road,” he said.
He and Dr. Wachter founded the non-profit organization Idaho Heart Foundation in 2017 with small CPR and AED training pop-ups at community events. The mission of the non-profit has grown to provide AEDs and life-saving equipment to first responders and public venues, to support the education and awareness of AED and CPR for the youth in the community, and to provide support group events for patients who have suffered from cardiovascular disease.
The annual Heart Ball is one of the many events that support the foundation’s mission. The Heart Ball will take place at the Shoshone-Bannock Event Center and will bring together heart health advocates, community leaders and supporters for a night filled with hope and inspiration.
Attendees will have the opportunity to bid on exclusive items during live and silent auctions, participate in exciting raffles and enjoy a delicious dinner.
All funds raised will support heart health initiatives across Idaho. For more information, head to www.idahoheartfoundation.org.