Heart attack survivor launches mobile bus to screen for heart disease

Tara Robinson, who at the age of 40 survived three heart attacks in the course of one week, advocates for and raises awareness about heart disease and stroke in the Black community.

“I suffered three heart attacks over three days and died during the third attack. After volunteering for the American Heart Association for years, I noticed that there wasn’t a community connection between their organization and Black people,” Robinson said in an interview with Voyage Dallas.

Since then, Robinson, now 48, founded the Black Heart Association, a non-profit whose mission is to “significantly reduce the number of Black deaths each year due to heart disease and stroke,” Good Morning America reported.

Heart disease is the leading cause of death for both men and women in the U.S., according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). And “Black women in particular are more likely to have conditions that increase their risk of heart disease, including high blood pressure, diabetes, obesity and pregnancy-related complications,” Dr. Sandy Charles, a cardiologist and medical director, told GMA.

Lifestyle changes and routine screenings for a variety of factors, such as cholesterol, obesity, blood pressure and more, can help reduce the risks.

To continue her efforts to raise awareness about heart disease, Robinson established her organization’s mobile heart center, a bus that provides free health screenings across the Fort Worth, Texas area.

“Our goal with the mobile bus is to make sure that we are wherever our people are — that’s at the car wash, the barbershop, the beauty shop, the church,” she told Good Morning America. “Wherever you are, that’s where the bus can pull up to.”