“Baseball Is Life”: How St. Louis Children’s at CoxHealth Keeps Jesse in the Game

On a hot Monday afternoon in the middle of summer, 9-year-old Jesse McIntosh took the baseball diamond for his team, the Mansfield Lions, at Cooper Sports Complex in Springfield. He runs. Pitches. Hits. Plays all over the infield. Displays all the energy and enthusiasm you’d expect from a kid playing the national pastime during the summer.  

“Baseball is life,” Jesse says, noting that his favorite player is Kansas City Royals shortstop Bobby Witt Jr. He even rocks Witt’s signature hairstyle with long, flowing locks in the back.  

“Yeah, he won’t let us cut his hair,” his mom Amanda McIntosh says with a smile.  

 All that joy was made possible by Jesse’s determination to thrive despite a serious heart condition, with advanced cardiac care and world-class expertise from St. Louis Children’s Hospital and WashU Medicine physicians. Thanks to the joint venture that formed St. Louis Children’s at CoxHealth, Jesse and other kids who live in southwest Missouri can receive specialty care much closer to home.  

St. Louis Children’s at CoxHealth opened on the Cox South campus in March. As the only independently licensed, full-service pediatric facility in southwest Missouri, it brings together nationally recognized clinical expertise from WashU Medicine physicians and a dedicated team of caregivers who are specially trained to provide exceptional, compassionate care close to home.  

“Jesse’s so tough,” Amanda says.  Less than a decade ago, Jesse was diagnosed with hypertrophic cardiomyopathy when he was three months old. The condition affects his heart, to where the muscle becomes thicker than normal and obstructs blood flow.  

 In 2025, he became the first pediatric patient in St. Louis and the youngest in the state to have a surgical procedure that placed an implantable extravascular cardioverter-defibrillator that helps manage the condition, protect his heart, and allow him to live like any other kid.