Twenty-Two-Year-Old Becomes Arizona's Latest Millionaire

At the age of only 22, Ted Myers of Glendale is Arizona’s latest millionaire. As the Grand Prize #1 winner in the Spring Health & Wealth Raffle, Myers received a prize package valued at more than $1 million dollars, including a T.W. Lewis home in Goodyear, a black 2008 Mercedes ML320 CDI and $100,000.

Entering the Raffle
Myers' streak of luck began when he called into radio station KEDJ FM (103.9) on his lunch break and won a $100 ticket from an on-air promotion. His mom, who has entered the Health & Wealth Raffle for years, predicted that Myers would win the grand prize as soon as she heard about the ticket.

Winning
Myers', a 2007 Arizona State University graduate and account executive at Phoenix New Times, is a member of a local band, Faucet. The band had been raising money to record its first album when Myers won the prize of a lifetime.

Myers first heard about his prize from Kathy Rice, manager of the Health & Wealth Raffle, when she left him a voice message. When Myers called her back, he was expecting to hear he had won a camera but instead found out he was the winner of Grand Prize #1 – valued at more than $1 million.

“I couldn’t believe it,” Myers said. “I texted my band members and told them not to worry about the money anymore—I just found a big investor who would pay for everything.”

The Decision
In the end, Myers decided to take the cash equivalent of the T.W. Lewis home. Myers is using his winnings to help his older brother adopt a child from Kazakstan and his younger brother purchase a car.

“I’m also making anonymous gifts here and there,” Myers said. “Some of my friends might see that someone made a $1,000 payment on their credit cards.”

Toddler Undergoes Brain Surgery
at Barrow

Raffle proceeds help Barrow develop
new life-saving procedures

Amanda Anderson celebrated her second birthday in April – just six months after a life-threatening cerebral aneurysm landed her in Barrow Neurological Institute. An aneurysm is a balloon-like bulge on a blood vessel that can rupture and cause dangerous bleeding in the brain.

“The aneurysm involved very small blood vessels deep in her brain, a very unusual situation in a child so young,” said Robert Spetzler, MD, director of Barrow. “The aneurysm had ruptured, causing a life-and-death situation.”

To safely reach the aneurysm, Dr. Spetzler used a route into the brain that was researched and developed at Barrow. Called the modified orbital zygomatic (OZ) approach, the procedure involves removing a small piece of bone at the top of the eye and going under the brain instead of retracting it.

The approach, says neurosurgeon Joseph Zabramski, MD, was critical to the success of the operation. “In young children, the skull is small, and there’s not much extra room around the brain. Retracting the brain can put pressure on it and damage it. With the modified OZ approach, we were able to reach the aneurysm without retracting Amanda’s brain.”

Upon reaching the aneurysm, Dr. Spetzler removed the abnormality and then did an unusual bypass surgery—also developed at Barrow—to repair the opening in the vessel.

Amanda recovered beautifully, says her mother, Shanna.
A week after surgery, she attended church, visited her grandparents and went to the zoo.

Life-saving surgeries such as Amanda’s are possible at Barrow because of the extensive research conducted there—much of it supported by the Health & Wealth Raffle. Your participation in the Raffle enables scientists at Barrow to continue improving patient care, ultimately benefiting patients like Amanda.

St. Joseph’s Opens New Unit to Treat Children with Epilepsy

Building on a long history of treating children with epilepsy, St. Joseph’s recently opened a five-bed Pediatric Epilepsy Monitoring Unit (Pediatric EMU) to care for and evaluate children who suffer from seizures. The new unit features:

• State-of-the-art medical equipment, including video-EEG monitoring equipment to diagnose seizures and evaluate epilepsy patients for surgery
• Individualized intracranial epilepsy monitoring to identify the onset of seizures
• Functional mapping to identify important brain regions for surgical planning
• Specialized staff, including highly-trained pediatric nurses, four subspecialty-trained pediatric epileptologists and child life specialists.

Children are admitted to the Pediatric EMU for monitoring, to determine the types of seizures they are experiencing, and to identify the location of the seizure onset. This information can be vital in determining if they are candidates for neurosurgery or alternative treatments such as dietary therapy. The unit is expected to treat more than 250 patients annually.

“St. Joseph’s offers one of the premier epilepsy programs in the country and is internationally known for its expertise in neurology and neurosurgery,” says Kevin Chapman, MD, pediatric epileptologist. “St. Joseph’s multidisciplinary approach in the treatment of epilepsy helps ensure that our patients receive the highest quality of care, while our research endeavors strive to advance treatments for epilepsy.”

St. Joseph’s opened Arizona’s first seizure clinic in 1954. In 1988, Barrow opened the Valley’s first Epilepsy Monitoring Unit. The hospital’s epilepsy program also features an active clinical trials program, two full-time epilepsy researchers and an internationally renowned Hypothalamic Hamartoma (HH) Program that treats children from all over the world. The hospital recently opened a Pediatric New-Onset Seizure Clinic to provide children with timely evaluation and appropriate testing for diagnosing childhood seizures.

Health & Wealth Raffle Winner Is a True Believer

Single Father wins big in Spring Health & Wealth Raffle

Trip Around the World

Raffle Funds Research into Devastating Brain Tumor

Research Into Diet for Epilepsy Receives Raffle Funding

Fall 2004 Raffle Contributes to Neonatal Intensive Care Unit

Thank you from St. Joseph’s Hospital

Thank you for your help – by participating in the Health & Wealth Raffle, you’re helping St. Joseph’s Hospital, Barrow Neurological Institute and Arizona stay at the forefront of medical care. Raffle proceeds are invested in innovative medical research, education, and patient care. Together, we are making one of the nation’s finest medical institutions even better – and that’s good for us all!