Former Fremd Runner Honored Through Free Heart Tests For Students
CHICAGO (CBS) -- A couple thousand high school students in Palatine were being tested for a genetic heart condition on Thursday, thanks to the generosity of an alum's family.
"It's been a wonderful, warm, fuzzy feeling for everybody," said Beverly Wargo, whose nephew, Joshua Jared Hardy, died of cardiac arrest in 2009, caused by an undiagnosed genetic heart condition.
"At the age of 21, he was out with his buddies, and he stood up, and he died on the spot," she said.
Hardy was a student at the University of Illinois at the time. He had graduated from Fremd High School in Palatine, and had been a cross-country runner.
Wargo said Hardy had hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (HCM), a genetic disease that causes a thickening of the heart, but which can be detected by an EKG test.
"I would never want another family to have a tragedy like that; to lose a child when there's something that can be done about it," Wargo said.
Since the year he died, a memorial 5K run "Hoofin' 4 Hardy" has been held to raise money to get high school students in Palatine School District 211 tested for HCM.
Wargo said it costs about $10,000 per school to have the testing done, and it took eight years to raise enough money for tests at all five high schools in the district.
On Thursday, a couple thousand Fremd students were being tested, according to Wargo. Students in the other four schools in District 211 will be tested next year.
