Edwards Champions American Heart Association Initiative to Reduce Deaths, Improve Care for Patients With Heart Valve Disease

Core Insights - Edwards Lifesciences has announced its founding sponsorship of the American Heart Association's Heart Valve Initiative, aimed at improving care and outcomes for over 28 million people with heart valve disease globally, with more than 60,000 deaths annually in the U.S. attributed to valve disease [1][2]. Company Initiatives - The Heart Valve Initiative will focus on enhancing patient education, clinician training, and quality improvement to drive measurable impact in the treatment of heart valve disease [2][3]. - The initiative will expand the existing Target: Aortic Stenosis program, which was also founded through Edwards' sponsorship, over the next five years [3]. Goals and Objectives - The initiative aims to improve adherence to guideline-based care, starting with aortic stenosis, and will expand data collection to include asymptomatic and moderate cases [6]. - Plans include establishing a heart valve certification program for hospitals, advancing public reporting and hospital recognition, providing multimedia education for clinicians and patients, and launching a national awareness campaign to support informed care decisions [6].