As a new year begins, we tend to look back at the previous year to remind ourselves of what we have accomplished and then decide what we want to achieve in the next year.  For our Mended Hearts chapter, 2025 was an outstanding year of accomplishments and I would like to share some of our successes with you.

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Our organization’s primary goal is to support heart patients and their families in our community by giving hope and encouragement.  We do this through a wide variety of visits and through educational speakers at our monthly meetings.  Last year we had more than 2,600 visits with patients and their families, up from 1,700 in 2024.

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More than 530 people attended our monthly meetings. In our efforts to educate our membership and guests, we covered topics that taught us how to ask the right questions before a medical procedure.  We learned what it’s like to be a nurse who works on a medical helicopter, we learned how to age better, and what we can do to help prevent dementia.  We learned about men’s heart health and how a perfusionist, operating a heart bypass machine, keeps our heart safe during open heart surgery.  We also enjoyed a picnic and a holiday potluck together.

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We collaborated with St. Joseph’s to reach out to heart patients who could become new hospital visitors.  Through this campaign we added ten newly certified hospital volunteers.  This allowed us to increase the number of visits in the Fireside Room and the hospital by 185% over the second half of the year. 

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We added a new chapter officer and new board members.  We welcomed Deenie Berry as our new secretary.  Deenie also conducted the Mended Hearts Inc., training course for our new volunteers.  Gene and Jan Knutson joined as our Membership Co-Chairs. All three are a tremendous addition to our chapter’s management team.

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We also enjoyed seeing two national awards presented in our chapter. Tammy Longstaff was named The Mended Hearts Inc. Volunteer of the Year and PeaceHealth St. Joseph Medical Center was named Hospital of the Year for the second time since 2018.

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I think we can agree we had a great 2025.  Thank you for being part of it.  We are on to 2026 where we will count on you to continue to be an active part of our chapter.  Give us your opinions and suggestions.  Consider volunteering somewhere in our chapter.  Help us make 2026 an even better, more successful year.