Psychosocial Factors in Coronary Heart Disease

Cardiovascular disease represents the leading cause of death globally, which includes mortality due to stroke and coronary heart disease (CHD); of these two forms of cardiovascular disease, CHD accounts for more deaths annually (World Health Organization, 2015). The primary features of CHD include plaque development in the coronary arteries (atherosclerosis), heart attack (myocardial infarct), and acute chest pain (angina; Labarthe, 1998). The traditional risk factors for CHD include age, obesity, high cholesterol, high blood pressure, inactive lifestyle, smoking, excessive alcohol consumption, and family history of the disease (World Heart Federation, 2015). Epidemiologic evidence suggests that traditional risk factors of CHD may account for 58–75% of new cases (Beaglehole & Magnus, 2002). Other predictors of CHD may include stress‐related psychosocial factors at a person level (e.g., dispositional hostility and depression) and/or environmental level (e.g., chronic work‐related stress and lack of social support; Albus, 2010)

Pilot Study: The Effects of a Mountain Wilderness Experience on Combat Veteran Psychosocial Wellness

The purpose of this quasi-experimental pilot study was to evaluate the efficacy of a 3.5day outdoor wilderness program (Huts for Vets, HFV) for reducing psychological distress, PTSD symptoms, and improving positive mood states. It was hypothesized that participation in the HFV program would predict improvements in psychosocial well-being in addition to reductions in PTSD symptomatology relative to a waiting-list control group. Participants included 51 adult veterans diagnosed with PTSD and/or some other combat-related disability (Mage = 36.8, SD = 8.19). The experimental group (n=32) participated in the HFV program, which included hiking and group discussions. Data collection via psychosocial scale administration took place two weeks prior to the HFV trip, on the last day of the trip, and at a 6-week follow-up. Participants in the control group (n=19) underwent the psychosocial assessments on the same schedule, however, they did not participate in the outdoor program. Results indicated significant and sustained reductions in depression, anxiety, somatic stress, negative affect, and PTSD symptoms among program participants, alongside acute improvements in positive moods, relative to the control group. The current findings suggest that therapeutic recreation offers promising benefits as a complementary intervention for combat veterans

Report on the excavation of a Punic tomb

On 19th November 2001, while two of us (DB, NJC) were preparing a drawn record of the Punic tomb that is situated on Bajda Ridge, Xemxija, a small ceramic bowl (100211) was uncovered from below a few centimetres of soil that covered the inner part of the threshold to the rock-cut chamber (Fig. 1). An official from the Museums Department was informed of the discovery on the same day and a site inspection was carried out. It was realised that more artefacts could lie undisturbed within the chamber and a decision was taken to excavate the deposit. Authorisation for the Department of Classics and Archaeology, University of Malta, to undertake the excavation was received from the Director, Museums Department, and the excavation was completed on the 22nd November. The tomb is located on the ridge, near a path that diverges eastwards from the track that links Pwales valley to the Mistra valley. It is cut in the Upper Coralline limestone that outcrops in the area on a North-South axis and consists of a sub-rectangular chamber that is reached through a low entrance at the bottom of a rectangular shaft (Fig. 1). The tomb appears in an inventory for the first time in 1996 when it was listed in the survey of archaeological sites prepared by Malta University Services for the Planning Authority by Anthony Bonanno in connection with the preparation of the North-West local plan for Malta. The tomb had been examined and photographed by one of us (NCV) in 1992. At the time, it was littered with debris and it was only with difficulty that a view of the chamber could be achieved through the entrance that was partly concealed by an irregular blocking stone. Late in 2000, members of the St Paul's Bay Heritage Group lifted the debris from the trench and cleared the area around the site.peer-reviewe

Hostile mood and social strain during daily life: A test of the transactional model.

Hostility is a multidimensional construct related to cardiovascular (CV) disease risk. Daily hostile mood and social interactions may precipitate stress-related CV responses in hostile individuals. Purpose: Determine whether trait cognitive hostility best predicts daily hostile mood and social interactions relative to other trait hostility factors and explore the temporal links between these daily measure

The Effects of Music on Mood and Perception of a Visual Stimulus

We examined the influence of music on mood by instructing 81 undergraduate students to complete the Multiple Affect Adjective Check List–Revised (MAACLR) both before and after watching a 15-min video that was or was not paired with a piece of music. The 2 music categories were pleasant or depressing. Participants from the depressing group experienced a drop in positive affect, whereas participants from the pleasant group showed an increase on this measure. Men from the pleasant group had the highest pretreatment and lowest post treatment anxiety scores, whereas the women displayed no change in anxiety. The results indicate that music has only a slight impact on mood

Safety and tolerability of sitagliptin in clinical studies: a pooled analysis of data from 10,246 patients with type 2 diabetes

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>In a previous pooled analysis of 12 double-blind clinical studies that included data on 6,139 patients with type 2 diabetes, treatment with sitagliptin, a dipeptidyl peptidase-4 (DPP-4) inhibitor, was shown to be generally well tolerated compared with treatment with control agents. As clinical development of sitagliptin continues, additional studies have been completed, and more patients have been exposed to sitagliptin. The purpose of the present analysis is to update the safety and tolerability assessment of sitagliptin by pooling data from 19 double-blind clinical studies.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>The present analysis included data from 10,246 patients with type 2 diabetes who received either sitagliptin 100 mg/day (N = 5,429; sitagliptin group) or a comparator agent (placebo or an active comparator) (N = 4,817; non-exposed group). The 19 studies from which this pooled population was drawn represent the double-blind, randomized studies that included patients treated with the usual clinical dose of sitagliptin (100 mg/day) for between 12 weeks and 2 years and for which results were available as of July 2009. These 19 studies assessed sitagliptin taken as monotherapy, initial combination therapy with metformin or pioglitazone, or as add-on combination therapy with other antihyperglycemic agents (metformin, pioglitazone, a sulfonylurea ± metformin, insulin ± metformin, or rosiglitazone + metformin). Patients in the non-exposed group were taking placebo, metformin, pioglitazone, a sulfonylurea ± metformin, insulin ± metformin, or rosiglitazone + metformin. The analysis used patient-level data from each study to evaluate between-group differences in the exposure-adjusted incidence rates of adverse events.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Summary measures of overall adverse events were similar in the sitagliptin and non-exposed groups, except for an increased incidence of drug-related adverse events in the non-exposed group. Incidence rates of specific adverse events were also generally similar between the two groups, except for increased incidence rates of hypoglycemia, related to the greater use of a sulfonylurea, and diarrhea, related to the greater use of metformin, in the non-exposed group and constipation in the sitagliptin group. Treatment with sitagliptin was not associated with an increased risk of major adverse cardiovascular events.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>In this updated pooled safety analysis of data from 10,246 patients with type 2 diabetes, sitagliptin 100 mg/day was generally well tolerated in clinical trials of up to 2 years in duration.</p

The human body at cellular resolution: the NIH Human Biomolecular Atlas Program

Abstract: Transformative technologies are enabling the construction of three-dimensional maps of tissues with unprecedented spatial and molecular resolution. Over the next seven years, the NIH Common Fund Human Biomolecular Atlas Program (HuBMAP) intends to develop a widely accessible framework for comprehensively mapping the human body at single-cell resolution by supporting technology development, data acquisition, and detailed spatial mapping. HuBMAP will integrate its efforts with other funding agencies, programs, consortia, and the biomedical research community at large towards the shared vision of a comprehensive, accessible three-dimensional molecular and cellular atlas of the human body, in health and under various disease conditions

Mechanism of cellular rejection in transplantation

The explosion of new discoveries in the field of immunology has provided new insights into mechanisms that promote an immune response directed against a transplanted organ. Central to the allograft response are T lymphocytes. This review summarizes the current literature on allorecognition, costimulation, memory T cells, T cell migration, and their role in both acute and chronic graft destruction. An in depth understanding of the cellular mechanisms that result in both acute and chronic allograft rejection will provide new strategies and targeted therapeutics capable of inducing long-lasting, allograft-specific tolerance