Mid-life predictors of late-life depressive symptoms; determining risk factors spanning two decades in the Women's Heathy Ageing Project.

Background: Data available from longitudinal studies of adequate duration to explore midlife risk factors for late life higher depressive symptom scores in women is lacking. This study examines midlife (mean ages 50 years and 60 years) predictors of late life (mean age 70 years) depressive symptom scores to enrich our understanding of the role of changing risk factors across the lifespan.

Methods: This investigation was an assessment of the long-term impact of lifestyle and health variables on depressive symptoms.

Impact of menopausal status on negative mood and depressive symptoms in a longitudinal sample spanning 20 years.

Objective: Studies examining depressive symptoms and negative mood across the postmenopause are lacking, particularly those that examine prevalence in early and late postmenopause. This study examines negative mood and depressive occurrence in the menopausal stages to provide a better understanding of prevalence of mood disturbance during this period.

Methods: This study was a longitudinal assessment of variables drawn from an epidemiological prospective study of women's healthy aging.

The trajectory of negative mood and depressive symptoms over two decades.

Objective: Research aimed at understanding the temporal characteristics of depressive symptoms and negative mood in an older female population is lacking, despite the relationship between the two factors being well established. The aim of this study was to examine the characteristics of negative mood scores and depressive symptom scores in a longitudinal sample of women transitioning from mid-life to late life.

Study Design: This study was a longitudinal assessment of variables drawn from an epidemiological prospective study of women's healthy ageing.

The course of depressive symptoms during the postmenopause: a review.

As the Australian population ages, significantly more women are entering the postmenopausal stage of the climacteric, yet research focusing on the prevalence of depressive symptoms in this stage of ovarian ageing is scarce. This review will examine the information provided by studies that have a cohort with data of adequate duration to explore depressive symptom prevalence in the early and late postmenopause. Longitudinal epidemiological studies of women transitioning through the postmenopause that included measures of mood and/or depressive symptoms were identified through searches of MEDLINE (1980-2014) and PsycINFO (1980-2014) databases.

The Women's Healthy Ageing Project: fertile ground for investigation of healthy participants 'at risk' for dementia.

Alzheimer's disease neuropathology (amyloid, tauopathies) and brain atrophy are present decades prior to manifestation of clinical symptoms. With the failure of treatment trials it is becoming clearer that the window for prevention and therapeutic intervention is before significant neuronal loss and clinical deterioration of cognition has occurred. Early identification of those at risk of disease and optimizing their management to prevent disease in later life are crucial to delaying disease onset and improving people's quality of life.

Advances in structural and molecular neuroimaging in Alzheimer's disease.

Longer life expectancies lead to increases in the prevalence of age-associated illnesses. The number of Australians with dementia is predicted to rise, from 234,000 in 2009 to over 1 million by 2050, as a result of the increased prevalence of Alzheimer's disease (AD), the leading cause of dementia in the elderly. Early diagnosis of AD will become more important as disease-modifying therapies emerge within the next decade.

A web-based normative data tool for assessing cognitive performance in healthy older Australians.

A decline in cognition greater than expected with ageing and accompanied by subjective cognitive concerns or functional changes may be indicative of a dementing disorder. The capacity to correctly identify cognitive decline relies on comparisons with normative data from a suitably matched healthy reference group with relatively homogeneous demographic features. Formal assessment of cognition is usually performed by specialist neuropsychologists trained in administration and interpretation of psychometric tests.

Multi-SNP pharmacogenomic classifier is superior to single-SNP models for predicting drug outcome in complex diseases.

Objectives: Most pharmacogenomic studies have attempted to identify single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) markers that are predictive for treatment outcomes. It is, however, unlikely in complex diseases such as epilepsy, affecting heterogeneous populations, that a single SNP will adequately explain treatment outcomes. This study reports an approach to develop a multi-SNP model to classify treatment outcomes for such a disease and compares this with single-SNP models.

Update on pharmacogenetics in epilepsy: a brief review.

Recent developments in the pharmacogenetics of antiepileptic drugs provide new prospects for predicting the efficacy of treatment and potential side-effects. Epilepsy is a common, serious, and treatable neurological disorder, yet current treatment is limited by high rates of adverse drug reactions and lack of complete seizure control in a significant proportion of patients. The disorder is especially suitable for pharmacogenetic investigation because treatment response can be quantified and side-effects can be assessed with validated measures.

Acute stroke thrombolysis with intravenous tissue plasminogen activator in an Australian tertiary hospital.

Objective: To report initial experience with the use of intravenous tissue plasminogen activator (tPA) to treat acute ischaemic stroke at an Australian tertiary-care hospital.

Design: Retrospective audit of computerised hospital stroke database.

Participants And Setting: All patients with acute ischaemic stroke treated with intravenous tPA between April 1999 and July 2002 at the Royal Melbourne Hospital, VIC.