The flight from Miami to Havana, Cuba, only lasted about 50 minutes - a short trip to a country that seemed so distant from America for a group of 16 first-year University of Kentucky College of Medicine students. During a trip to learn about Cuba's socialized health care system, a group of UK students were surprised to find that Cubans knew much more about American culture than Americans knew about Cubans. The young Cubans they met could name American historical figures like Martin Luther King Jr. and popular television shows like How I Met Your Mother. They could also discuss U.S.

Though Christopher and Jonathan Feddock practice in two completely different UK HealthCare areas, both physicians contribute to discovery everyday.   

Dr Alison Bailey has been named the director of Ambulatory and Preventive Cardiology for UK HealthCare. In this role, Bailey will oversee the Gill Heart Institute's outpatient practices in Lexington and continue to provide oversight of the cardiac rehabilitation program. “Unfortunately, the patients we see have more complex health issues than ever before,” said Dr. Susan Smyth, director of the Gill Heart Institute.

In Kentucky, a state with many unfortunate health statistics, rates of diabetes and obesity are increasing and are among the worst in the nation. According to America's Health Rankings, more than 1 million adults are obese in Kentucky and the prevalence has increased from 30.4 percent to 31.3 percent in the past year, placing Kentucky 42nd nationally.

Each year the University of Kentucky pauses to recognize the achievements of its students at the annual University Honors and Recognition Awards Program. Hosted in the Frank H. Harris Grand Ballroom in the Student Center, students were recognized with university-wide awards at a ceremony Monday, April 14. The ceremony boasted several of the university's brightest and hardest working students.

UK HealthCare's Gill Heart Institute has received the "Get With The Guidelines-Resuscitation Gold Quality Achievement Award" for maintaining specific quality measures outlined by the American Heart Association for the treatment of patients who suffer cardiac arrests in the hospital. This year marks the first year that Gill has received Gold designation. "We've always been proud of our ability to provide the best possible outcomes for our patients, but it's gratifying to have that acknowledged by the American Heart Association," said Dr.

The UK Center for Clinical and Translational Science (CCTS) has launched a new website that is especially oriented to researchers who currently use or could benefit from CCTS resources, including research services, funding opportunities, and education and career development. The CCTS offers a spectrum of multidisciplinary support to assist investigators across the entire cycle of clinical and translational research, from protocol development and participant recruitment to regulatory affairs and evaluation.

At the University of Kentucky, the gross anatomy course that introduces students to the intricacies of body systems is reserved for graduate-level students. But, as Dr. April Richardson-Hatcher has discovered, real-world rules can be bent in a virtual universe. A professor of anatomy and neurobiology in the UK College of Medicine, Hatcher teaches Anatomy 309: An Introduction to Regional Anatomy, a course that meets weekly in the 3-D virtual world of Second Life.

A team of nanotechnology researchers at the University of Kentucky has discovered new methods to build heat resistant nanostructures and arrays using RNA. The research, led by Peixuan Guo, professor and William Farish Endowed Chair in Nanobiotechnology at the UK College of Pharmacy and Markey Cancer Center, is reported in an article titled "RNA as a Boiling-Resistant Anionic Polymer Material To Build Robust Structures with Defined Shape and Stoichiometry," coauthored by Emil F. Khisamutdinov and Daniel L.