Telepsychiatry services at a tribally run behavioral health clinic.

Telepsychiatry provides a helpful resource to rural, poor, and isolated communities for whom traditional psychiatry may not be an option. Focusing on a tribally run behavioral health clinic, this article describes the clinic's transition from traditional psychiatry to telepsychiatry and then delineates benefits and challenges of telepsychiatry in this setting. Telepsychiatry is recommended based on the experiences of this clinic serving a large southwestern Native American community.

Lifelong estrogen exposure and cognitive performance in elderly women.

Fluctuating endogenous and exogenous estrogens influence cognition in women. In this study, cognitive functioning in elderly women was examined by applying methodology used in understanding the effects of chronic estrogen exposure on hormone-sensitive tissue other than the brain. An index, combining menstrual, reproductive, and physical markers associated with estrogen levels, was developed for elderly, nondemented, predominantly Caucasian women (n = 87).

Body weight, estrogen and cognitive functioning in Alzheimer's disease: an analysis of the Tacrine Study Group data.

We conducted a retrospective analysis of clinically ascertained Alzheimer's disease subjects, hypothesizing that weight, given its positive relationship to endogenous estrogen levels, would correlate with better cognitive performance among women, but not necessarily men, with this disorder. Baseline (pretreatment) data, collected by the Tacrine Study Group were available from 347 women and 316 men. After controlling for age, duration of dementia, height, and education, we found weight to have a significant, positive relationship with two measures of global cognitive functioning among women.