What is TAKEheart?

TAKEheart is an AHRQ initiative to help hospitals increase participation in cardiac rehabilitation (CR). CR is a medically supervised secondary prevention program that provides patient-centric education, risk factor mitigation, supervised exercise training, and psychosocial support to improve cardiovascular health.

Despite CR's many documented health and cost benefits, it has long been underutilized; fewer than a third of patients eligible to participate in CR do so. The TAKEheart initiative was designed to reverse this long-standing trend by developing training and actionable guidance for hospitals wishing to implement strategies to boost CR referrals and enrollment.

TAKEheart training modules and related materials were originally developed to support over 100 hospitals as they worked in real time with AHRQ-provided guidance and coaching, to implement two proven strategies—automatic referral and enhanced care coordination—for increasing patient participation in their CR programs. These resources have been updated, based on these hospitals' experiences, and redesigned to enable any hospital interested in implementing these strategies to do so independently and at their own pace.

Additional TAKEheart resources available for download include webinars featuring CR champions from diverse hospitals sharing knowledge about strategies for addressing common challenges to CR participation and for better supporting traditionally underserved populations.

The TAKEheart Initiative: Origins, Evolution, and Proven Strategies for Improvement

The Case for Cardiac Rehab

The Four Pillars of TAKEheart and How They Can Benefit Your Hospital

Foundational Resource

Cardiac Rehabilitation Change Package