Desert Museum: One for the Heart

Blood, immensely magnified, looks like a design of red bagels interspersed with speckled, translucent pickled onions. At least, that’s the way it looks on the large, soft plastic wall in Heartland, the Museum of the Heart Institute of the Desert in Rancho Mirage.

Bruce Underwood, director of the museum, showed me the unfinished museum and told me the plans for its completion.

“Heart disease is still the No. 1 killer in the United States, but we know a lot more about it now. That’s why we wanted to build a museum so people could see what happens and what they can do,” he said.

Underwood ticked off a list of grim statistics. In the entire population, 27% to 29% have high blood cholesterol, 25% smoke and 20% have high blood pressure. Lack of exercise greatly increases the chance of heart disease.

Dr. Jack Sternlieb, head of the cardiac surgery program at Eisenhower Medical Center, is the founder and chairman of the Heart Institute of the Desert, a 55,000-square-foot building that houses his large staff and the technological equipment they use, as well as the fledgling museum.

“The museum is Dr. Sternlieb’s project to help people avoid heart attacks. He thinks education is the best prevention,” Underwood told me. “Almost 9,000 schoolchildren saw the (incomplete) museum last year.”

The large institute has a staff of exercise physiologists, a room full of fitness equipment, a cardiology staff, an aerobics center, a walking and jogging track, locker rooms and showers. The museum includes the wall illustrating blood, videos on food preparation and an exhibit about prevention of heart disease.

Underwood is working toward the completion of the museum with Adam Rubenstein, a medical illustrator, who is working on a long list of exhibits with buttons to push, answers to read and models to examine.

They plan on a large benefit called the Hearts of Gold Gala to provide the money.

Dionne Warwick will supply her satiny songs at the party next Sunday at the Desert Springs Marriott Resort in Palm Desert. Honorees of the evening will be Howard and Ardith Marguleas. The couple are known for their generosity to a whole list of causes in the Coachella Valley, including the donation of the Girls and Boys Club vans in La Quinta.

The museum will be designed to look like a heart chamber with its entrance through an immense plastic heart valve. There will be an exhibit to show the buildup of plaque in the arteries and explain how to reduce the buildup. A diagram will show blood circulation.

There will be a video disc system where visitors can push buttons and have questions answered. A short film will explain how to cook without using fatty ingredients. By the time visitors have been through the museum they will have a great deal of knowledge about avoiding heart disease.

Underwood has a master’s degree in exercise physiology, a master’s in public health and a doctorate in health science.

The museum, he said, will provide “a new avenue to the consciousness of health.”