Better oral reading and short-term memory in midlife, postmenopausal women taking estrogen.

Objective: Considerable controversy surrounds the issue of whether estrogen influences cognitive function in postmenopausal women, and the results are far from consistent. For the most part, the cognitive processes studied have involved memory; to our knowledge, no previous studies have specifically examined the effects of estrogen on women's reading ability.

Design: To investigate reading and short-term memory in postmenopausal women treated with conjugated equine estrogens, we carried out a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial of 21 days in 60 midlife, postmenopausal women aged 32.

Expression and regulation of interleukin-8 in human fallopian tubal cells.

Objective: The human fallopian tube creates the microenvironment for fertilization and early embryogenesis. Salpingitis may result in infertility and ectopic pregnancy by causing tubal blockage and hydrosalpinx. To better understand the relationship between infectious inflammation and tubal damage, we investigated the expression and regulation of interleukin-8 in human tubal epithelial and stromal cells in culture.

Chemokine receptor expression in human endometrium.

Chemokines play a role in endometrial physiology and pathology and may affect endometrial receptivity and menstrual shedding. Chemokines exert their effect by binding to their relevant receptors, the expression levels of which may modulate their action. In the present study, we examined the expression of chemokine receptors CXCR1 and CXCR2 (receptors for interleukin-8) and CCR5 (receptor for RANTES [regulated-on-activation, normal-T-cell-expressed and -secreted], macrophage inflammatory protein [MIP]-1alpha, and MIP-1beta) in human endometrium.