Risk of hospital readmission and cardiac mortality increases with atmospheric pollution for patients with heart failure. The underlying mechanisms are unclear. Carbon monoxide (CO) a ubiquitous environmental pollutant could be involved. We explored the effect of daily exposure of CO relevant to urban pollution on post-myocardial infarcted animals. Rats with ischemic heart failure were exposed 4...

OBJECTIVE To investigate the health and nutrition status in middle-aged and old people in the urban district of Chongqing City, China in order to provide a rational diet construction for the population. METHOD This investigation was performed in 2004 and 1801 public officials both at post and retired in the urban district of Chongqinging City were enrolled in this investigation. Among them 96...

STUDY OBJECTIVE To identify geographical differences in coronary heart disease (CHD) attack rates in a small urban area and to relate these to indicators of socioeconomic class. DESIGN CHD attack rates were calculated from data of the Ghent MONICA myocardial infarct register for the period 1983-87. The city of Ghent is subdivided into 201 sectors based on morphological, and socioeconomic char...

BACKGROUND Congenital heart disease (CHD) represents one of the most prevalent congenital malformations. However, few studies use whole-population screening by colour Doppler ultrasonic diagnostic system to identify CHD among live infants. We estimate the prevalence of CHD and its major risk indicators among infants aged less than 6 months in urban Tianjin, China. METHODS A colour Doppler ult...

background: echocardiographic evaluations of the longitudinal axis of the left ventricular (lv) function have been used in the diagnosis and assessment of heart failure with normal ejection fraction (hfnef). the evaluation of the global and segmental peak systolic longitudinal strains (pslss) by two-dimensional speckle tracking echocardiography (ste) may correlate with conventional echocardiogr...

INTRODUCTION The difference between modern lifestyle in urban areas and the traditional way of life in rural areas may affect the population's health in developing countries proportionally. In this study, we sought to describe and compare the metabolic (fasting blood sugar and lipid profile) profile in an urban and rural sample of a Cameroonian population, and study the association to anthropom...

the Hauora Manawa/Heart Health: Community Heart Study is a research project currently being undertaken at the University of Otago, Christchurch. The purpose of this study is to identify the prevalence of cardiovascular risk within three cohorts: a rural Maori (Wairoa, Hawkes Bay), an urban Maori (Christchurch) with an ageand gender-matched non-Maori cohort (Christchurch). Participants (aged 20–...

The concept of diastolic heart failure (DHF) is not new. However awareness and understanding on this subject may remains uncertain among medical practitioners. We wished to examine the extent of awareness of such entity among doctors in Malaysia. A questionnaire was designed and distributed randomly during hospital Continuous Professional Development (CPD/CME) sessions and also in the respectiv...

Urbanization is one of the great challenges of our time and unchecked haphazard urbanization is a serious threat both to the environment and social and economic balance. In order to meet global sustainability targets, rapid urban growth must be channelled into environmentally friendly, sustainable and liveable urban environments. Thus, this special issue focuses on sustainable urban design whic...

INTRODUCTION Treatment delay during myocardial infarction may be due to a number of factors, such as age, sex, socioeconomic status and interpretation of symptoms. However, whether residence plays a role has not been fully investigated and, if known, could provide information that will help target specific populations. This study investigated whether urban and rural residents in Greece differ i...