The American Heart Association announced the launch of its first-ever heart transplant research network, a bold initiative designed to transform how heart transplant care is delivered across the United States. The network includes 14 medical research centers and a coordinating center, bringing together scientists from around the country to create a national, unified data, research and quality care infrastructure to improve heart transplant outcomes.
According to the American Heart Association’s 2026 Heart Disease and Stroke Statistics, about 4,500 heart transplantations were performed in the U.S. in the most recent year, yet more than 3,700 people remained on the waiting list. “Despite decades of breakthrough advances in cardiovascular medicine, the system supporting heart transplantation has remained largely unchanged. Today, transplant recipients still face serious challenges, including difficulty detecting heart rejection early, reliance on immunosuppressive therapies that have seen little advancement over the past 20 years and inconsistent outcomes, especially among Black patients and children,” said Mariell Jessup, M.D., FAHA, the chief science and medical officer of the American Heart Association.
The initiative focuses on three key pillars: a global heart transplant data infrastructure, a research network for breakthrough science, and a coordinated path forward modeled after the Association’s Get With The Guidelines success. The data infrastructure will develop a comprehensive heart transplant database enabling real-time insights for research and quality improvement. The research network will focus on earlier detection of rejection, remote monitoring technologies, viral surveillance, and development of safer therapies. The coordinated path forward will establish a scalable quality improvement framework to standardize care and improve long-term outcomes.
The network includes centers such as Baylor College of Medicine, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Columbia University, Duke University School of Medicine, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Mayo Clinic, Medical University of South Carolina, Stanford University, University of California San Diego, University of Colorado Denver, University of Pennsylvania, University of Utah, and Vanderbilt University Medical Center. The coordinating center is led by Emilia Bagiella, Ph.D., at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai.
“By bringing together this exceptional data, research and clinical expertise, the Heart Association can help accelerate discoveries and translate them into better care for every patient, no matter who they are or where they live,” Jessup said. The Association has funded more than $6.1 billion in cardiovascular research since 1949.
