Hospital executives plotted to get a millionairess patient to give them cash donations and other gifts by tapping into the elderly woman's childlike love of the Smurfs and The Flintstones.

Reclusive heiress Huguette Clark was a voluntary patient at Beth Israel Medical Center in New York for two decades before she died in 2011.

During that time she made a number of sizable donations to the hospital and some staff. It has emerged today that officials even planned how they would get more money from her.

According to the New York Post, one official suggested sending the then 86-year-old a birthday gift of Smurf or Flintstone balloons because 'Smurfs are her new cartoon'.

Hospital CEO Dr Robert Newman is said to have enlisted the help of his own elderly mother to befriend Clarke and would allegedly force her to go to the heriess' room on a daily basis with the sole objective of 'obtaining even more purported gifts', court papers say.

At one point, Newman’s mom was directed to keep asking Clark for a cash gift 'even if she changes the subject to Smurfs or Flintstones'.

The court papers detail that on one occasion in 1998, the elderly lady was sent to watch a Smurf movie with Clark as a guise under which to talk to her about the 'great joy and spiritual satisfaction of preparing her will', which she had not done yet.

'I kid you not! My mom spent 30 minutes watching the Smurfs celebrate Christmas: she deserves a medal,' Newman reported, according to court papers obtained by the Post.