American Heart Association webinar pairs estate planning with legacy giving during awareness week
During National Estate Planning Awareness Week, the American Heart Association is moving the conversation about wills, beneficiaries, and long-term giving out of the legal office and into a public forum. The organization will host a free educational webinar, “Your Legacy, Your Way: Estate Planning for Peace of Mind,” on Tuesday, October 20, with the stated goal of making the planning process easier to understand for people starting from scratch and for those revisiting older documents.
An estimated 56% of Americans do not have an up-to-date estate plan, a gap that leaves financial affairs, health-related wishes, and charitable intentions vulnerable to delay or dispute. In practice, estate planning is often treated as something to postpone until later in life, but the consequences of waiting can surface quickly after an illness, a death, or a change in family structure. A current plan can help preserve assets, reduce confusion for loved ones, and make sure personal values are reflected in medical, financial, and philanthropic decisions.
This webinar is designed for a broad audience. First-time planners can hear the basic elements they need to consider. People who already have a will or related documents can use the session to check whether beneficiary designations, decision-makers, and charitable wishes still reflect their current circumstances. The education format matters here because estate planning is not a single document; it is a coordinated set of choices that only works when the pieces align.
Wills, beneficiaries and decision-makers sit at the center of the discussion
The session will cover essential documents commonly included in an estate plan, key decisions involved in planning for the future, considerations for people reviewing an existing plan, and practical next steps intended to make the process feel less intimidating. That list reflects the real structure of estate planning: the legal tools are only as effective as the conversations behind them. A will can direct assets, but beneficiary designations can override assumptions if they are left unchanged. Powers of attorney and healthcare-related documents can be just as important as financial instructions when a person can no longer speak for themselves.
Estate planning also reaches beyond personal finance. For many families, it becomes a way to define how values outlast the original benefactor. Charity, faith communities, universities, and health organizations often enter the discussion only after the basics are settled, yet these decisions can be made in the same process as care for spouses, children, or other dependents. In that sense, the webinar is not only a financial education event; it is a guide to organizing priorities before illness, death, or incapacity creates pressure.
Lee Shapiro, volunteer chairperson of the American Heart Association and managing partner and co-founder at 7wireVentures, framed estate planning as a set of decisions that extends beyond paperwork. His remarks point to the central tension many people face: the work feels complex, but the individual decisions are usually straightforward once broken into manageable parts. Clear information can turn a vague intention into a workable plan.
One sentence captures the practical stakes: an outdated estate plan can leave loved ones to sort out uncertainty at the worst possible moment.
Planned giving links personal legacy with cardiovascular research support
The American Heart Association is also using the webinar to connect estate planning with planned giving. Donors who choose to leave a legacy gift through charitable financial planning are recognized as members of the Paul Dudley White Legacy Circle, a designation within the Cor Vitae Society. The naming carries historical weight within the association, honoring one of its founders and a pioneer of preventive cardiology.
Planned gifts are presented as a mechanism for sustaining research, education, policy work, and community health efforts over time. The organization says it has invested more than $6.3 billion in scientific discovery since 1949, and legacy gifts are part of the financial support structure that helps maintain that role. For a health organization focused on cardiovascular disease and stroke, the logic of legacy giving is direct: long-horizon funding supports long-horizon science. Prevention, early intervention, and evidence-based care all depend on steady investment that does not disappear when a fundraising cycle ends.
The webinar arrives during a week dedicated to raising awareness about estate planning because many people still treat it as an abstract administrative task rather than a functional part of family protection. Yet beneficiary forms, wills, trusts, and charitable bequests affect who receives assets, who can act on someone’s behalf, and how a person’s intentions are carried out. Those decisions become especially consequential when a family is already coping with grief or a medical crisis.
Advance registration is required, and registrants will receive a collection of estate planning guides for instant download. Additional resources on wills and beneficiary designations are also available through the association’s estate planning materials. The educational approach is simple: reduce uncertainty, translate legal terms into usable steps, and encourage people to update documents before life events force the issue.
For the American Heart Association, the webinar also fits a broader organizational mission. Planned giving supports not only fundraising, but continuity. The association’s leaders are positioning legacy planning as a way to protect families and to support the causes people care about most, while ensuring that cardiovascular research and public health work continue across generations. The unanswered question for many participants will not be whether estate planning matters, but which documents need attention first and how soon those decisions can be put on paper.