Surgery can be scary, especially for children, but one local group is working to put smiles on kids’ faces before medical treatment at the University of Iowa Children’s Hospital. Hats for Heroes is a group of volunteers who make surgical caps with bright colors, funky designs, and familiar characters for kids. Jeannette Wagner, a surgical tech at the hospital, helped start the group in Washington County earlier this year, after seeing that a hospital in New York was trying to give pediatric patients choices and one of those was an option of which surgical hat to wear. She then approached staff at the Children’s Hospital who approved the volunteer effort. She says she’s seen firsthand the positive impact, “Especially when a child is coming in for surgery, they come in scared and they have their parents and they don’t really know what’s going on. The option of giving them a cool hat that has Paw Patrol on it or My Little Pony or something, they really, really enjoy that. And it kind of takes their mind off of what they don’t understand is happening next.” The group tries to meet once a month to sew hats and donates approximately 250 each month.

WACO junior Sierra Gillis helps in making the hats and recently taught 4-H members how to make them, “It’s just a really good way to give back to your community and they can relate really well to their (the patients) age.”

Hats for Heroes accepts donations of hats, elastic, materials, and money to purchase materials. Visit Hats for Heroes on Facebook to connect with the private group and donate.