All Care is Not Equal

When it comes to receiving quality health care for a stroke or heart condition, unfortunately, all care is not equal. There are many factors that contribute to ensuring the best patient outcome. The first starts with you knowing your risk factors, reducing them if you need to, and knowing the signs and symptoms of a heart attack or stroke. Knowing your health status is the first step to help you and your doctor make decisions that positively impact your health and the quality of your health care. To learn your risk or simple lifestyle changes to be your healthiest, visit www.heart.org/mylifecheck.

The second key to quality health care is well educated medical professionals. When it comes to research and guidelines for patient care, the American Heart Association truly sets the standard for quality care. We not only publish new research, verify and promote new guidelines, provide free professional education and conferences, we make it easy for physicians and nurses to locate all of these resources at www.my.americanheart.org

The third key to quality care is to ensure that all patients are receiving the best care, every time. We set the standard for guidelines for treating heart disease and strokes, and to ensure they are routinely applied to patients we have developed an award winning hospital program - Get With The Guidelines. Hospitals and clinics using the program have improved patient outcomes, shorter inpatient stays and fewer re-admissions. Is your hospital a Get With the Guidelines hospital? To learn more about our hospital quality programs, visit our Focus on Quality page, and ask your doctor if his or her hospital participates in Get With the Guidelines.

Knowledge is the first line of defense against the diseases of the heart and stroke. To learn more, visit www.heart.org anytime.