Pioglitazone protects HDL(2&3) against oxidation in overweight and obese men.

Background: The worldwide epidemic of obesity is a major public health concern and is persuasively linked to the rising prevalence of diabetes and cardiovascular disease. Obesity is often associated with an abnormal lipoprotein profile, which may be partly negated by pioglitazone intervention, as this can influence the composition and oxidation characteristics of low-density lipoprotein (LDL). However, as pioglitazone's impact on these parameters within high-density lipoprotein (HDL), specifically HDL(2&3), is absent from the literature, this study was performed to address this shortcoming.

Prediction of unexpected sudden death among healthy dogs by a novel marker of autonomic neural activity.

Background: Unexpected sudden death among apparently healthy individuals remains a daunting problem. We have previously shown that autonomic modulation of cardiac arrhythmias and autonomic markers, such as baroreflex sensitivity (BRS) and heart rate variability (HRV), carry predictive power after myocardial infarction.

Objective: We tested the hypothesis that a parameter combining BRS and HRV could predict risk for ventricular fibrillation (VF) during a first ischemic episode in otherwise healthy dogs.