The Challenge

In terms of expenditures and lost productivity, cardiovascular disease costs Americans over $500 billion dollars annually. 

Our ability to reduce the incidence of cardiovascular disease and death will ultimately depend on improved understanding of the limits of cardiovascular performance and our ability to translate genetic insights into treatments and therapies for individual patients. New approaches are crucial to advancing personalized, evidence-based medicine that will allow us to reach those most at risk for developing cardiovascular disease.

Our challenge is to help every heart patient live their healthiest life today and tomorrow.

Why Duke?

Duke Heart is ranked among the top cardiovascular programs in the nation.

It is staffed by the country’s leading cardiology and cardiothoracic surgical specialists, who treat more than 65,000 people with heart disease every year and work at the forefront of innovative scientific discovery and clinical care.

At Duke, we work every day to advance the future of heart care. We seek to:

• deliver safe, dignified, top-quality care, guided by best practices.
• foster inclusive and equitable environments across our multidisciplinary teams.
• lead the discovery of knowledge and interventions to improve cardiovascular health globally.
• empower all patients, trainees, and colleagues with knowledge and the tools for success.

Duke provides world-class patient care, trains the best and brightest to serve future generations, and discovers new therapies to improve the health of all patients. 

Recent Duke Heart highlights:

• As one of the nation’s highest-volume programs, Duke is a leading innovator for heart transplants, performing a number of first-in-the-world and -U.S. procedures, including “donation after circulatory death” transplantation; implantation of the next-generation artificial heart; combined thymus tissue-and-heart transplant; and partial heart transplant of living arteries and heart valves.
• Duke is a national leader in minimally invasive surgery, including arterial grafting, a complex procedure that extends the life of coronary artery bypass graft (CABG) surgery.
• Duke is advancing non-invasive methods with cardiac imaging (MRI) to innovate new ways to identify the causes of heart dysfunction and develop novel methods and devices to diagnose and treat heart failure.
• Duke is also advancing research that seeks to identify and address how other systems in the body influence heart function and dysfunction.
• Duke-led and -designed clinical trials of devices and drugs are improving treatment options for those with
• arrhythmia.
• Duke’s Pediatric and Congenital Cardiovascular Surgery Program continues to produce outcomes that meet or exceed the Society of Thoracic Surgeons benchmarks, even in patients with the most complex malformations.

The Opportunity

We believe we can improve heart health by scaling genetic and physiologic insights to deliver personalized medicine and speed the pace of new therapies, new diagnostics, and new treatment options.

Duke Heart is improving lives, advancing science, training leaders, and expanding access to care. We are committed to excellence and a culture of inclusivity and respect.

We invite you to join us in this important work. With your help, we will develop new and more effective therapies, treat more patients, and serve society as a global leader in advancing transformative changes in heart care.

You Can Make a Difference

Philanthropic partners are essential to our success. Every expendable, endowed, or planned gift makes a difference. You can help Duke Heart change lives by:

Investing in tomorrow's leaders

An endowment of $2,000,000 will create lasting support for early-career faculty, helping us attract great physicians and scientists, and provide them with the resources necessary to innovate and lead.

Funding innovative research

Your gift of $100,000 to $300,000 will advance cutting-edge research and clinical trials, pioneering new approaches that directly improve the lives of patients.

Supporting patients and improving care

Your gift of $100,000 or more will help address the needs of our patients and their families, supporting better health outcomes and improved quality of life.

Advancing technology and data science

Gifts of $100,000 or more will expand the use of advanced technology and equipment to ensure delivery of the most innovative care.