# The HEARTS Act: Understanding a Bill About Heart Disease Education and Research

The HEARTS Act is focused on cardiomyopathy, a disease that affects the heart muscle and can range from having no symptoms to causing serious problems like heart failure or sudden cardiac death. This bill aims to help more people—especially families and children—understand the warning signs and get screened early, while also funding research to better understand the disease.

The bill requires the federal government to create educational materials about cardiomyopathy and distribute them to schools, teachers, coaches, parents, and healthcare workers. These materials will explain what cardiomyopathy is, how to recognize it, and what to do in a cardiac emergency. Schools will receive guidance on where to place automated external defibrillators (those emergency heart-shock devices you might see in public places) and how to develop emergency response plans. Parents will get a risk assessment tool to help them figure out if their family members might be at risk for the disease. All of this information will be posted online through the CDC website and state education agencies so it's easily accessible to anyone who needs it.

Beyond education, the bill directs the CDC and National Institutes of Health to conduct research and surveillance on cardiomyopathy to better understand how common it is, how it affects people across different ages, and what treatments work best. The CDC will report to Congress on emergency room visits, hospitalizations, and healthcare costs related to the disease. The NIH will focus on understanding what causes cardiomyopathy, including genetic factors, and will study long-term health outcomes for patients of all ages. The bill allocates $5 million per year from 2025 through 2028 to fund these efforts.

HEARTS Act of 2024

Pallone, Frank

Cardiomyopathy Health Education, Awareness, Research, and Training in the Schools Act of 2023&nbsp;or the HEARTS Act of 2023This bill establishes a series of programs and requirements relating to cardiomyopathy. (Cardiomyopathy refers to a collection of diverse conditions of the heart muscle that can affect the ability of the heart to pump blood.)Specifically, the Department of Health and Human Services must disseminate information about cardiomyopathy and the use of automated external defibrillators to certain school professionals, families, and others, and it must develop specified risk assessment tools for cardiomyopathy. In addition, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention must report on certain research and surveillance activities, and the National Institutes of Health must report on its research relating to cardiomyopathy.