Heart health for South Asians: improved cardiovascular risk factors with a culturally tailored health education program.

Background/aim: The Kaiser Permanente (KP) Northern California Heart Health for South Asians (HHSA) Program is a two-hour educational class that provides culturally relevant lifestyle and dietary recommendations to South Asian (SA) patients, in an effort to reduce their known disproportionate burden of cardiovascular (CV) disease. We evaluated the impact of the HHSA Program on CV risk factors and major adverse CV events (MACE).

Methods: A retrospective cohort study identified 1517 participants of SA descent, ≥ 18 years old from 2006 to 2019.

Habituation of hissing by Madagascar hissing cockroaches (Gromphadorhina portentosa): evidence of discrimination between humans?

Anecdotal reports suggest that insects can be "tamed" with frequent human contact. In the present experiment, repeated handling of Madagascar hissing cockroaches by the same person resulted in habituation of the hissing response in ten of 12 subjects. These subjects were then handled by a novel person in order to determine whether habituation might be specific to a particular human.

Prediction and preparation: Pavlovian implications of research animals discriminating among humans.

A growing body of evidence suggests that animals of various species can discriminate among the humans with whom they have regular contact. This discriminative ability has considerable implications for research. Because animal life is hedonistic, there is a strong incentive for animal subjects to predict the events that bring them pleasure and pain.