Nervios and dysphoria in Mexican American widows

One hundred widows participating in experimental research entitled Efficacy of Support Groups for Mexican American Widows were studied to learn how they express the loss of their husbands. Mourning practices, acknowledged symptoms of dysphoria, and somatic reactions were studied to learn if the syndrome of nervios subsumes their reaction to bereavement. In addition, their responses to instruments designed to measure depression, the Spanish version of the Beck Depression Inventory and the Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale, were examined for correlation with nervios and relationships to Mexican American acculturation. Nervios seems to be a manifestation of dysphoria rather than a specific syndrome for these women.

Monocular ischemia--the influence of carotid atherosclerosis versus primary ocular disease on prognosis

The etiology of monocular ischemia influences the clinical manifestation and long-term neurologic and visual prognosis. During a 10-year period, 140 patients with monocular visual symptoms were evaluated and assigned to a carotid bifurcation occlusive disease group (group I) or a primary ocular disease group (group II) on the basis of angiographic findings and ophthalmologic evaluation. Patients with symptoms secondary to emboli from the carotid bifurcation tended to have a shorter duration of blindness and a lower incidence of permanent blindness initially and during follow-up. The presence of Hollenhorst plaques or retinal artery occlusion did not have any discriminatory diagnostic value since the incidence was similar in both patient groups. Since both primary eye disease and carotid bifurcation occlusive disease can be initially seen as monocular ischemia, carotid angiography and ophthalmologic consultation are necessary to select those patients who will benefit from carotid endarterectomy.

The taxonomy of social support: an ethnographic analysis among adolescent mothers

Current approaches to assessing the health-related functions of social support are based on a theoretical frame of reference regarding the taxonomic structure of social networks. Nearly all previous work addresses the issue of social network taxonomies from an etic (i.e. objective, outside) rather than emic (i.e. subjective) perspective. Because of this, we intensively studied 5 unmarried adolescent mothers over the year following the delivery of their firstborn infants, utilizing ethnographic methods to elicit detailed portrayals of their personal, subjective taxonomies of social network support. Ranked in order of successful adaptation to parenthood, the young women with the best outcomes displayed a richer, more differentiated view of their social networks' taxonomic structure and regarded individual network members as more diverse in their capacity to provide broad, multi-faceted support. A common element among all subjects was the tendency to discriminate among categories of network members according to the stability and continuity perceived in individual relationships.

Hot and cold in women's ethnotherapeutics: the American-Mexican West

The purpose of this paper is to report the current status of hot/cold principles in the ethnotherapeutics of women of southwestern U.S.A., northwestern Mexico. The paper presents a secondary data analysis from three studies, including a data bank of Women's Ethnotherapeutic Agents derived from literature searches, interviews of women in research of Mexican American Grandmothers as Health Care Advisors, and research in the historical roots of the ethnotherapeutic agents used in contemporary domestic medicine. This report presents women's home remedies, what these remedies are believed to do, and the sources of this domestic therapy knowledge. It concentrates on persistence and change in one aspect of the theoretical base of these remedies, their humoral complexional classification. In the analysis of data from these studies, continuation of aspects of the hot/cold theory is demonstrated. It is suggested that the persistence is tacit, with the lack of articulated knowledge of humoral theory today stemming from the content of contemporary remedy books. Instead of arguing either diffusion or independent invention, commonly held ethnophysiological concepts are offered as a possible explanation for the persistence of hot and cold therapy practices.

Lay theory of healing in northwestern New Spain

Northwestern New Spain experienced not only a territorial and a spiritual conquest, but a medical conquest. This medical conquest came from a tradition, established after the conquest of central New Spain, that had fused classical medicine of the Old World with medicine of indigenous groups, in the writings of European doctors and scientists as well as graduates of Mexican colleges. The medical conquest of Sonora was accomplished by laymen, explorers and missionaries who carried the theory of healing resulting from these syncretic processes into the northern lands, adding new materials that they learned from indigenous peoples there. When the Indians were ill with epidemic disease or injuries, they were cared for by missionaries brought up on European domestic medicine. The theory of illness and its cure held by the lay healers became predominantly that of the conquest culture. The conquerers', missionaries' and colonists' interpretations of native plant, animal and mineral remedies that they learned from northwestern native medicine were colored by their own concepts of disease and healing, resulting in an epistemology which continues to guide lay or domestic medicine not only in Sonora but also in the rest of the American Mexican west today.

Cortisol binding in uremic plasma. II. Decreased cortisol binding to albumin

We measured cortisol binding to albumin in uremic plasma during a study to see if increased morning plasma free cortisol values, reported previously in chronic renal failure patients, could be explained by binding abnormalities of plasma proteins. Cortisol binding was measured in plasma from chronic renal failure patients and compared to values in normal controls. The unbound and albumin-bound fractions of plasma cortisol were determined using an isocolloidosmolar equilibrium dialysis method and heat inactivation of corticosteroid-binding globulin. A lower ratio of albumin-bound cortisol to unbound cortisol was seen in uremic than in nonuremic plasma (p less than 0.05). This difference was eliminated when uremic plasma was treated with dextran-activated charcoal. These studies suggest that cortisol binding to albumin is decreased in uremic plasma because of a heat-stable substance which is removed from plasma by charcoal treatment.

Cortisol binding in uremic plasma. I. Absence of abnormal cortisol binding to cortisol binding to corticosteroid-binding globulin

Increased morning plasma free cortisol levels have been reported previously in chronic renal failure (CRF) patients. To see whether binding abnormalities of plasma proteins contributed to the increase in morning free cortisol, binding characteristics of corticosteroid-binding globulin (CBG) were studied in pooled plasma from CRF patients and normal subjects. Using an isocolloidosmolar equilibrium dialysis method the unbound, albumin-bound, and CBG-bound fractions of plasma cortisol were measured within the physiologic range of plasma cortisol levels. Cortisol binding to CBG was equal in uremic and nonuremic plasma as determined by the affinity constants and the binding capacities of CBG for cortisol. In addition, the distribution of cortisol binding was identical in uremic and in nonuremic plasma samples at equal total cortisol concentrations. By confirming that cortisol binding properties of CBG are unaltered in CRF patients, these data support the assertion that elevated morning free cortisol levels in CRF patients are probably due to increases of plasma total cortisol.

Ethnography of the menopause-related hot flash

Research was conducted to learn how women of two ethnic groups in the United States experience and describe menopause-related hot flashes, their reports of associated events and activities, and the ways in which they cope with the occurrence of the flashes. The women's cognitive ordering of events was learned through ethnographic inquiry, using questions which were derived from respondent-generated topics. Descriptions and responses to this physiological event were similar, but interpretation differed. Middle-class Anglo American women spoke of the sensations negatively, but for Mexican American women, the menopausal hot flash had positive components of meaning.

Tachistoscopic visual perception after closed head injury

Tachistoscopic visual perception was examined in 42 right-handed closed head injury patients and 10 normal controls by determining the duration for recognition of a trigram in central vision and by employing a visual field laterality task. Thresholds did not vary with severity of injury but were significantly longer than those of controls for midly, moderately, and severely injured patients. A nonsignificant right visual field superiority for trigram recognition was exhibited by all groups. Recognition of trigrams in either visual field was impaired in moderately and severely injured patients relative to controls. Possible explanations for these findings are discussed.

Kimmswick: A Clovis-Mastodon Association in Eastern Missouri

Stone tools characteristic of the Clovis culture have been found in direct association with bones of the American mastodon at Kimmswick, Missouri. The vertebrate fauna from Clovis components suggests a deciduous woodland and meadow habitat. Such an environmental reconstruction provides a new perspective for Clovis adaptations and the ecological tolerances of Mammut americanum.

Lexemic change and semantic shift in disease names

The lexicon of illness terms used by Mexican American women is affected by the practice of speaking both Spanish and English and by the coexistence of several health systems. When there is changning participation in various health systems, with increasing interference and code switching, linguistic evidence for these changes may be found. In some cases an English disease name is borrowed. In others, a cognate is coined from an English disease name. Some terms, now no longer useful, are dropped. Finally, some Spanish disease names which do not have equivalents in English or in scientific medical theory may be retained, but there is a shift in the meaning of the words themselves. The direction of the shift is towards semantic correspondence with the concepts of scientific medicine. In these ways the medical lexicon is changed, with the changes reflecting a new medical culture.