Molecular landscape of the overlap between Alzheimer's disease and somatic insulin-related diseases.

Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a multifactorial disease with both genetic and environmental factors contributing to its etiology. Previous evidence has implicated disturbed insulin signaling as a key mechanism that plays a role in both neurodegenerative diseases such as AD and comorbid somatic diseases such as diabetes mellitus type 2 (DM2). In this study, we analysed available genome-wide association studies (GWASs) of AD and somatic insulin-related diseases and conditions (SID), i.

An Electrophysiological and Proteomic Analysis of the Effects of the Superoxide Dismutase Mimetic, MnTMPyP, on Synaptic Signalling Post-Ischemia in Isolated Rat Hippocampal Slices.

Metabolic stress and the increased production of reactive oxygen species (ROS) are two main contributors to neuronal damage and synaptic plasticity in acute ischemic stroke. The superoxide scavenger MnTMPyP has been previously reported to have a neuroprotective effect in organotypic hippocampal slices and to modulate synaptic transmission after in vitro hypoxia and oxygen-glucose deprivation (OGD). However, the mechanisms involved in the effect of this scavenger remain elusive.

Insulin and disorders of behavioural flexibility.

Behavioural inflexibility is a symptom of neuropsychiatric and neurodegenerative disorders such as Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder, Autism Spectrum Disorder and Alzheimer's Disease, encompassing the maintenance of a behaviour even when no longer appropriate. Recent evidence suggests that insulin signalling has roles apart from its regulation of peripheral metabolism and mediates behaviourally-relevant central nervous system (CNS) functions including behavioural flexibility. Indeed, insulin resistance is reported to generate anxious, perseverative phenotypes in animal models, with the Type 2 diabetes medication metformin proving to be beneficial for disorders including Alzheimer's Disease.

A crisis emerges: Lesbian health between breast cancer and HIV/AIDS.

In this essay, I argue that lesbians have come to be a population of concern for state-based health organizations as a result of lesbian health activism that drew connections between breast cancer and HIV/AIDS. In order to develop this analysis, I tell the story of the rise of lesbian breast cancer activism in concert with HIV/AIDS in San Francisco in the early 1990s. The state recognition of lesbian health needs, and with it the solidification of lesbian as a biopolitical category, was catalyzed by associations with the AIDS crisis and HIV activism, but also required an articulated difference, or lesbian specificity, which breast cancer provided.

Parents' supportive reactions to sexual orientation disclosure associated with better health: results from a population-based survey of LGB adults in Massachusetts.

This study investigated associations between coming out to parents, experiences of parental support, and self-reported health behaviors and conditions among a population-based sample of LGB individuals using data collected via the 2002 Massachusetts Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS; N = 177). We explored the following two hypotheses: 1) Lesbian, gay, and bisexual (LGB) individuals who had never disclosed their sexual orientation to a parent would report higher levels of risk behaviors and poorer health conditions than those who had come out; and 2) among LGB respondents who had come out to their parents, the individuals whose parents had reacted unsupportively would report higher levels of risk behaviors and poorer health conditions than those who had come out to parents who were supportive. Approximately two thirds of gay and bisexual (GB) males and lesbian and bisexual (LB) females reported receiving adequate social and emotional support from the parent to whom they first disclosed their sexual orientation.

Comparing sexual minority cancer survivors recruited through a cancer registry to convenience methods of recruitment.

Purpose: Sexual minority women, defined as having a lesbian or bisexual identity or reporting a preference for a female partner, are not considered by cancer surveillance. This study assesses the representativeness of sexual minority breast cancer survivors, defined as having a lesbian or bisexual identity or reporting a preference for a female partner, who were recruited into a convenience sample compared with a population-based registry sample of sexual minority breast cancer survivors.

Methods: Long-term survivors of non-metastatic breast cancer who self-reported as sexual minority were recruited from a cancer registry and subsequently from the community using convenience recruitment methods.

Overweight and obesity in long-term breast cancer survivors: how does sexual orientation impact BMI?

In noncancer populations lesbians have greater odds of obesity compared with heterosexual women, suggesting a similar pattern among cancer survivors. Weight of cancer survivors is an important area of study because obesity is associated with an increased risk of recurrence and shorter survival. Sixty-nine lesbian and bisexual and 257 heterosexual survivors of breast cancer were recruited to participate in a one-time telephone survey.

Planning for future care needs: experiences of unmarried heterosexual and sexual minority women.

This study examined the experiences of legally unmarried, middle-aged and older sexual minority (e.g., lesbian, bisexual) and heterosexual women in planning for future care needs and long-term assistance.

Advance care planning by unmarried women of different sexual orientations: the importance of social support.

We examined social support as a facilitator of advance care planning in unmarried women of different sexual orientations. Survey participants consisted of 215 women, 90 who reported a preference for partnering with women (WPW) and 125 for partnering with men (WPM). Our findings indicate that the association between social support and advance care planning was mixed.

Using cancer registry data for recruitment of sexual minority women: successes and limitations.

Objective: To identify and recruit an unknown and presumably small subgroup of survivors, that is, lesbian or bisexual women with breast cancer.

Methods: This report describes our multistep approach to recruit a representative sample of heterosexual and sexual minority breast cancer survivors. We used census data to identify geographic areas with a greater prevalence of sexual minority women (SMW), that is, lesbian and bisexual women.