This holiday season, Abbott is sure to warm hearts in a Hallmark Channel film that puts the company’s medical devices and its patient community on the top of the metaphorical tree.
Abbott-partnered Hallmark flick “The More the Merrier” will feature cameos from real-life members of the company’s HeartMates program, a patient community led by team captain Damar Hamlin.
Hamlin, a safety for the NFL’s Buffalo Bills who made headlines after suffering a near-fatal cardiac arrest on the field during a televised game in early 2023, will also be seen in the film and has personally met each of the five kids and teenagers set to appear alongside him, Abbott said in a Sept. 11 press release.
Outside of the cameos, the "heartfelt" movie's plot will shine a light on heart health and Abbott’s products.
Part of Hallmark’s classic “Countdown to Christmas” holiday movie lineup, “The More the Merrier” tells the yuletide story of two doctors at a small, rural hospital who find themselves snowed in on Christmas Eve. Amid an “unexpected baby boom,” a 14-year-old heart patient named David brings “unexpected joy, connection and a few surprises to everyone around him.”
The David character takes inspiration from real-life HeartMates teammate Zeke Mankins, a Dallas-based teenager who underwent open-heart surgery at age 12 to receive an Abbott Masters mechanical heart valve. Mankins, now 17, was the first patient advocate drafted onto the HeartMates roster by Hamlin himself, according to Abbott.
Mankins and Hamlin filmed a scene for the film in Buffalo, New York, along with 10-year-old Tony Daly, 16-year-old Jaden Hartley, 19-year-old MacKenzie Maddry and 9-year-old Rian Krauth.
“'The More the Merrier' is more than a holiday movie; it’s a celebration of a community coming together to support one another through unexpected turns—which is exactly what the Abbott HeartMates program is all about,” the company said in its release.
Everyone on the HeartMates team roster has received an Abbott cardiovascular device, whether it be the HeartMate 3 left ventricular assist device that supported both Hartley and Maddry before heart transplants or treatments from Abbott’s Amplatzer family of occluder devices that can repair holes in the hearts of premature babies, as was the case for Daly and Krauth.
Hamlin partnered up with Abbott to launch HeartMates in 2023 after recovering from his commotio cordis-caused cardiovascular event and wanting to help others “achieve their own comeback stories,” as he said at the time.
The 11-strong inaugural HeartMates team was selected last year at a dedicated Draft Day, which Abbott and Hamlin hosted alongside now-retired three-time Super Bowl champion Tedy Bruschi, who received an Abbott device after a stroke in 2005.