TodayPoster child picked for Heart Walk
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The McLaughlin family, Jack, Keenan, 10, Karen, Karsen, 3, and Jackson, 8, play their favorite family board game "Mouse Trap" last week at their Silver Spring home. (Jason Malmont/The Sentinel)
The McLaughlin household is seen playing games together above. (Jason Malmont/The Sentinel)
Keenan McLaughlin remembers the "great" view from his hospital room, his 1-year-old roommate and being allowed to take his "blankie" and beloved "Floppy Man" toy into the operating room with him.
His parents recall the fear of letting their 3-year-old son go under the knife for major heart surgery seven years ago.
"We kept preparing him by saying he had a little problem; his heart had a boo-boo," Keenan’s mother, Karen McLaughlin, says. Beneath the show of calm and bravado, she and Keenan’s dad, Dr. Jack McLaughlin, were terrified, even though the surgery to close a congenital hole between the upper chambers of Keenan’s heart wasn’t complicated.
"When it’s your child, and they’re going to open his chest, stop his heart and fix it, those are scary words," Karen McLaughlin says.
Jack McLaughlin, a Harrisburg gastroenterologist, "knew all the complications that can occur" with such a surgery. "You never know. I’ve seen even simple things go awry."
Ancient history
Keenan, now 10, views his surgery at Hershey Medical Center as ancient history. "It’s all behind me now," he says.
But for his parents, the boy’s strength and energy — he just got his green belt in tae kwon do and also plays soccer — remind them to give back to the association whose research made his survival possible.
After the McLaughlins got involved with the American Heart Association’s annual Heart Ball several years in a row, someone asked why. They told Keenan’s story, and the Silver Spring Township boy was invited to be the poster child for the 2006 Heart Walk.
Over the years, the American Heart Association has funded research that yielded discoveries such as CPR, life-extending drugs, pacemakers, bypass surgery, the heart-lung machine and surgical techniques to repair heart defects.
The vigilance of Keenan’s doctor led to his being diagnosed at just 9 months old. His father says the boy would have experienced major problems if the heart condition had gone undetected until he was an adult.
The atrial septal defect, or ASD, was discovered after the doctor heard a heart murmur and ordered an EKG, which showed a 10-millimeter hole. Keenan never had any noticeable symptoms from the heart problem, but "as his heart got bigger, the hole got bigger," his dad says.
Keenan’s heart even became asymmetrical as one side grew larger than the other because it had to pump harder. So the doctor ordered surgery when he was 3.
A year after the surgery, it had returned to normal, his parents say.
Now in fifth grade at Green Ridge Elementary School, Keenan plays soccer and loves video games.
Sunday event
The poster child will take part in the Oct. 8 Capital Region Heart Walk, with a little help from a whole bunch of friends and family. His parents made up nautical T-shirts advertising the group as "Keenan’s Krew," a nod to the family passion for sailing.
Groups from St. James Presbyterian Church in Hampden Township, Crone’s Tae Kwon Do in Silver Spring Township and perhaps Green Ridge Elementary School’s student council also will walk with Keenan.
More than 1,000 set to take part in fundraiser
The 15th annual Capital Region Heart Walk will take place at 2 p.m. Sunday at Harrisburg Area Community College. Registration will begin at 1 p.m.
More than 1,000 walkers from Cumberland, Perry and Dauphin counties are expected to participate, including heart disease and stroke survivors like Keenan McLaughlin (see story). They can choose a 3-mile or a 1-mile route, both starting from the athletic field near Evans Physical Education Building.
The heart walk raises money for the American Heart Association and brings attention to walking for good health.
Team and individual walkers can sign up by calling the Capital Region American Heart Association, 795-9514, extension 204.
State Sen. Patricia Vance, R-31, and Diann C. Roffe, senior consultant at the Leadership Management Institute in Camp Hill, are this year’s walk co-chairwomen.
Roffe is an Olympic gold and silver medalist in alpine skiing and also won a Wold Championship gold medal and a Pan American Games gold medal.
Vance, a professional nurse, serves in the state Senate as vice chairwoman of the Aging and Youth Committee and is a member of the Public Health and Welfare Committee, among others.
Heart disease and stroke are the nation’s number 1 and number 3 killers, respectively. Together they claim more than 910,000 American lives every year and cost more than $403 billion in direct and indirect costs.
