Partnering to Reduce Risks and Improve Cardiovascular Outcomes

The mission of the American Heart Association (AHA) is summarized by the statement, “Building healthier lives free of cardiovascular disease and stroke.” Reaching this goal will take significant advances in both science and clinical care but also will require a new level of engagement and action on the part of the public and patients in their health and health care. Recently, the AHA published “Translating Research Into Practice for Healthcare Providers: The American Heart Association’s Strategy for Building Healthier Lives Free of Cardiovascular Disease and Stroke,”1 which summarizes the AHA’s efforts to actively foster cardiovascular research and evidence-based clinical care among healthcare providers. Although assisting the work of scientists and clinicians is critical to achieving the AHA’s mission, it remains only part of the equation. Consumers and patients must be educated and engaged both to prevent cardiovascular events and to improve their outcomes after events occur. Recognizing this, the AHA has embarked on a robust set of initiatives designed to help individuals understand and modify their cardiovascular risk factors, to seek care when appropriate, to partner with their physicians and healthcare professionals to better treat their disease, and to help make changes in industry and workplaces. This report, the second of a 2-part series, summarizes the AHA’s consumer- and patient-related activities to motivate healthy behaviors, improve risk factor control, and manage cardiovascular disease (CVD) and stroke.It is clear that achieving lasting risk factor modification is a challenging endeavor. From a behavioral perspective, the substantive change occurs only after individuals move through several states: from a precontemplative to a contemplative state, from a preparatory to an action state, and finally to a maintenance state. Thus, the AHA has designed a series of initiatives and programs to address each of these states (Figure 1). The public must be made aware …