First Midwest Bank Charitable Foundation Banks for Kids

The Pediatric Oncology Treasure Chest Foundation was overjoyed to receive an enormous donation of $5,000 recently from the First Midwest Charitable Foundation. The donation will directly benefit children and teens fighting cancer.

The First Midwest Charitable Foundation is a private foundation headquartered in Itasca, Illinois. Funding for the foundation comes from First Midwest Bank. First Midwest Bank is a full-service bank providing a full range of business and retail banking and trust and investment management services through 129 offices located in 64 communities throughout Illinois as well as northwest Indiana and eastern Iowa. The mission is to fund programs that improve the lives of women and children in their market area.

First Midwest Senior Vice President Cheri Rubocki said, “We are pleased to support the Treasure Chest Foundation for everything they do. The organization is outstanding” First Midwest Bank Residential Lender Maureen Cipolla said, “Our hearts are filled to know that a toy from the Treasure Chest can take the sting out of the ongoing cancer treatments for the children fighting cancer.”

Treasure Chest Foundation Founder and CEO Colleen Kisel said, “We greatly appreciate First Midwest Charitable Foundation’s support. Their donation will help support thousands of children and teens who endure years and years of unending cancer treatments by rewarding the patients with a toy, gift or gift card after every procedure.”

The POTCF is a unique organization whose services impact more than 14,000 young cancer patients in 59 cancer treatment centers in 20 states across the nation. Nowhere else in the nation does such a program exist. Colleen Kisel founded the organization in 1996 after her then seven-year-old son Martin had been diagnosed with leukemia in 1993. Ms. Kisel discovered that giving her son a toy after each procedure provided a calming distraction from his pain, noting that when children are diagnosed with cancer their world soon becomes filled with doctors, nurses, chemotherapy drugs, surgeries and seemingly endless painful procedures. Martin celebrated his 26th anniversary of remission from the disease in March of 2019.

If you would like further information about the Treasure Chest Foundation, please contact Colleen Kisel at 708-687-TOYS (8697) or visit the Foundation’s web site at www.treasurechest.org.