Championing Heart Health: AR+D Joins the Live to the Beat Movement

AR+D has joined forces with Live to the Beat — a national campaign led by the CDC Foundation and Million Hearts®, the initiative co-led by CDC and CMS, that helps adults take small, manageable steps to prevent heart disease and stroke, with a focus on Black adults ages 35 to 54.

The partnership reflects our long-standing commitment to health equity and culturally responsive health communication. Heart disease is the leading cause of death in the United States, and its burden falls unevenly — it accounts for a larger share of deaths among Black Americans than among any other racial or ethnic group — making culturally tailored outreach not just valuable but essential.

What we're doing

Through our partnership, AR+D is providing bilingual content development, community engagement strategy, and distribution support across California — building on Prevention Forward, the English and Spanish platform we built for CDPH, which carries heart disease resources, Million Hearts® materials, and continuing-education training in cultural humility. Our team is working with community-based organizations, faith communities, and healthcare providers to extend the campaign's reach to populations that traditional health communication often misses.

Why culturally responsive campaigns matter

A growing body of research suggests that health information reflecting the cultural context, language, and lived experience of a community is more effective than translated versions of materials designed for other audiences.

For cardiovascular health specifically, cultural factors shape everything from dietary patterns and physical activity norms to healthcare-seeking behavior and trust in medical institutions. Effective campaigns must account for these dimensions — not as an afterthought, but as foundational design principles.

What we've learned

The most effective health communications we've developed share a common trait: they emerge from genuine listening. Before we develop any campaign materials, we spend time with the communities we're trying to reach — understanding their concerns, their trusted information sources, and the cultural contexts in which health decisions are made.

This work reinforces what we believe at AR+D: the path to health equity runs through rigorous research, authentic partnership, and a deep respect for community knowledge.