Doctors With Heart

Promoting access to cardiology care

Telemedicine program connects participating health care facilities with volunteer cardiologists at no cost to patients

The American Heart Association has established Doctors With Heart to provide quality cardiology consultations to under-resourced communities via telemedicine. The program features no-cost, doctor-to-doctor cardiovascular consultations by American Heart Association volunteer cardiologists to participating primary care clinicians in Federally Qualified Health Centers and community health centers who are treating underinsured and uninsured patients.

Under-resourced populations have a disproportionately higher incidence of chronic and debilitating conditions including cardiovascular disease.1 The Center’s Health Technology Advisory Group is leading the vision to develop the Doctors With Heart program to help bridge the gap in care to under-resourced communities.

Doctor Marie Ann Navar

Ann Marie Navar, M.D., Ph.D., a cardiologist at UT Southwestern Medical School, is a key member of the Advisory Group and was central to the early days of the program pilot. Navar helped conceptualize Doctors With Heart based on an informal consultation system she had with clinicians, including her parents, who are volunteer health care professionals at a community health center that provides free medical care to the uninsured and under-insured of South Texas.

Dr. Navar receives the Award of Meritorious Achievement (Video)

Doctors With Heart has successfully provided consultations for patients at three health centers across the U.S. in a 2020-2021 pilot program. Funding for the pilot program was provided by the Aetna Foundation, an independent, charitable and philanthropic affiliate of CVS Health. CVS also supports the American Heart Association as national presenting sponsor of Go Red for Women®.

Overview (PDF)


Access to specialist care for cardiovascular disease can be expensive, geographically limited and unavailable to communities who need it most, yet health consultations that include cardiovascular considerations can improve life expectancy without extra costs.
(Lauritzen, T. et al., 2008)2

Success Story

Success stories from that pilot are already rolling in, like this one: A primary care physician in Texas knew his patient with heart failure needed a cardiologist, but the patient had significant barriers to getting the expertise and treatment he desperately needed. The physician reached out via the program to American Heart Association volunteer cardiologist John Osborne, M.D., CEO State of the Heart Cardiology in Grapevine, Texas, for consultation. The physician and cardiologist consulted digitally on the Doctors With Heart platform and collaborated to create a treatment plan that is expected to be highly successful.

“With the plans we have in place for this patient, you’re going to add years to his life, and he’s going to feel so much better.”

  • John Osborne, M.D., American Heart Association volunteer cardiologist and CEO State of the Heart Cardiology
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Doctor John Osborne

Need more information?

Whether you’re a potential program sponsor, you work with a health center interested in the program or are a cardiologist who would like to donate time to provide consultations, we would like to hear from you.

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