Aicarm: a new association fights heart diseases

Florence - The model is American, the site of HCMA, the association that deals with hypertrophic cardiomyopathy founded in 1996 and which has 17 thousand members. There are therefore all the most up-to-date tools in the communication strategy ofAicarm (Italian Association for the study and research of Cardiomyopathies), non-profit organization established in December 2019, which aims to help patients with Cardiomyopathy (heart muscle disease), "to improve their quality of life and survival and to disseminate and deepen scientific knowledge in this field".

"When we talk about leukemia, for example, everyone immediately understands what we are talking about, they know the disease and its causes, but the same cannot be said of cardiomyopathy," he says. Frank Cecchi internationally renowned cardiologist, former medical director of the Careggi and Meyer Hospital of Florence, former professor at the University of Florence and then S.Raffaele-Vita of Milan, president of the Association.

Spreading the knowledge of the disease with the double effect of increasing support for the sick and, at the same time, to create a collective sensitivity around this pathology is the goal of Cecchi and the other 21 founders of Aicarm, including the cardiologist Jacopo Olivotto, associate professor of Cardiology and Director of the Cardiomyopathies Unit AOUC Careggi e Valerio Pellini, for many years general manager of the Tuscany Region, who was appointed vice president.

In a few months, including the three of the lockdown, the members have become 58, mostly patients, their relatives, various supporters. These are numbers destined to grow rapidly, given the projects that the Governing Council has already planned between now and the end of 2021.

Meanwhile, the site is becoming the driving force of a communication activity. The fundamental notions on cardiomyopathies are transmitted to users also through stories of some patients they tell themselves that help to understand the moods, emotions and even fears of those who live their lives with this disease and also how this condition is reflected. inevitably on the lives of their families.

In the coming autumn, the communication strategy plans to take the indispensable step of involving the most important social networks (Facebook, Linkedin, Instagram, Twitter) with consistent and constant interventions by the best specialists who deal with the study and treatment of the disease. Three webinars (free online seminars) on cardiomyopathies are already scheduled after the summer.

However, the leap in quality compared to similar initiatives will come from the most important projects who will soon make technologically advanced tools available to patients to easily control heart disease. Two of them are in the home straight and will be announced shortly.

In this launch phase, the collection of funds obviously continues, which is done through the request to third parties for donations, bequests and contributions of a non-compensatory nature and theallocation of 5 per thousand iby entering the tax code  94288930483 in the form of the Tax Return 2020. 

Photo: from left Valerio Pelini and Franco Cecchi

We want to thank you Piero Meucci for the article and for having allowed its publication on the Aicarm Onlus website.